


Be Not Afraid of Greatness

by suomifae



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Minor Character Death, Not Phantom Planet Compliant, clockwork is a meddlesome lil shit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-25
Updated: 2016-06-25
Packaged: 2018-05-03 07:45:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 45,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5282570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suomifae/pseuds/suomifae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny Fenton had been through a lot in his life and by his senior year at Casper High he thought he'd seen it all. But with a meddling Master of Time for a guardian and secrets being kept from him, he really should have expected better than that. It's gonna be one hell of a year.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Endless Exposition

**Author's Note:**

> haaa i haven't written fanfic in a while wow. this... will eventually be iambic prose i promise... you have ibeleiveinahappilyeverafter and spoopy-kasena to thank for this, first of all for making fall in love with this ship and secondly for letting me borrow their versions of GW and Randy soooooo its late and im delirious so here we go... tis a tiny thing for now

 

 

> _"Be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them." - William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night_
> 
>  

Life had calmed down quite a bit for Danny Fenton over the years. He was no longer fighting ghosts at every hour of the day and actually had time to focus on other things, namely his school work. He was about to start his senior year of high school after all and he couldn’t afford his grades slipping again like they had when he had first started out fighting.

He was rather smart when he put his mind to it, and had enough sleep to do so of course, and he still had the faintest hope of somehow working for NASA. While he couldn’t be the astronaut he had always dreamed of being, he could never past the physicals without his ghost half being exposed, he still had hopes of at least being a part of NASA and helping in space exploration. He needed to graduate first, though, before he could even think about all that.

And to graduate, he needed to get to school _on time_ for once in his life. But he was running late. _Again_. It was the first week of school and he was already sleeping past his alarm and running around the house like a wild man.

“Fruit, sweetie?” his mom held out a bowl of assorted fruits. Danny eyed them suspiciously and without seeing a trace of ectoplasm (though really, what harm could it do him at this point?) he deemed it safe and took a few apples with a grin.

“Thanks mom!” he said as he bit into one and shrugged on a jacket.

“Have a good day at school,” was his mom’s cheery reply. He waved without looking back to show that he’d heard, mouth too full of fruit to verbally respond.

And with that and keys in hand he was out the door.

Ah yes, time to endure the joys of Casper High. Running late by at least five minutes already and his day was off to a fantastic start.

Sarcasm.

Danny quickly hopped in his car, a smaller yet no less… interesting version (kinda) of the RV. It was an old used car originally, Danny had no idea which as he hadn’t seen it before his parents modified it beyond recognition (a present for his 16th birthday), but now it was sleeker and very high tech. His parents called it the Fenton Ghost Racer (supposedly for how fast it was- which was really, really fast). The best part was that it was completely decked out anti-ghost weaponry and he didn’t have to pay for gas because it ran on ectoplasm. Sometimes he honestly felt like Batman in this thing and he loved it.

Danny shoved the key in the ignition and the car sprang to life with a deep, soft purr. God he loved his car. He quickly shifted into reverse and backed out of the garage. He hit the road and grinned. Now for his favorite part of the day. It was a good thing (and probably deadly) that he had inherited his dad’s driving skills as he soon he was pulling into the school parking lot with a record ten minutes to spare and apple completely devoured.

“You’re late!” Sam yelled from where she usually chained her bike as Danny hopped out of the Racer.

“Not yet I’m not!” he shouted back gleefully, still high of the adrenaline from the ride.

Sam rolled her eyes, but the smile on her face gave away her amusement. Danny soon caught up to where she was standing and they both headed into the school building, rushing just a tad bit so they really wouldn’t be late.

“Tucker here yet?” Danny asked as they headed to their shared home room.

“Nope,” Sam replied, popping the p as she said it, “our favorite little techie has yet to arrive.”

“Aw, are you guys gossiping about me?” a baritone voice behind them sounded, “All good things I hope?”

Danny chuckled as his other best friend, Tucker, joined the fray on the way to home room (a blessing they all had the same one to be honest). “Nah, Sam was just calling you a weenie.”

Tucker faux pouted when Sam nodded her head solemnly, “Biggest weenie to ever ween.”

Tucker sighed dramatically. “You guys are so mean to me,” he whined, drawing out the e in me.

“Well, what else are friends for?” Danny drawled as they finally walked through the door to the classroom just as the bell rang.

“True,” Tucker mumbled before they took their seats.

The nerdy little trio they had been in freshman year had grown a lot since their freshman year.

Tucker, surprisingly enough, was the one to hit the largest growth spurt. He was lanky and towered over almost everyone, even if he wasn’t that bulky. He was just tall. He had also switched out his larger glasses frames for smaller and thinner ones. They were still black plastic, but they showed off more of his face and looked much better on him. He had also ditched the beret and simply left his head mostly shaved. He’d taken to wearing less yellow too, opting for red or green polos on most days and brown jackets on colder ones.

He’d mellowed out a bit, they all had, but was still as obsessed with tech and programming and hacking as he had been. He’d also been able to catch himself a girlfriend once he stopped (almost desperately) insisting that he was a “lady killer” and trying to hit on every girl he met. Granted he met her online (and was that really such a surprise?) and they had a long distance relationship, but Tuck was happy and that’s what mattered most.

Sam had also grown, though less in height and more in curves. She hated it too, because it made almost every boy in the school think they were entitled to come up to her and flirt. While Sam never resorted to violence, boys generally left in tears from just her glaring. It was pretty fun to watch, honestly. He and Tucker had set up a betting system a while back. Danny was winning.

But along with her curves, she’d also changed her wardrobe a smidge. It was still goth, all dark and slightly intimidating, but it was softer somehow. She wore more sweaters and longer skirts and classier jewelry. She also had her hair in a pixie cut now and often dyed it different colors, sometimes pastel, sometimes neon, sometimes back to black (like it was now), just whatever she was in the mood for.

She was still passionate about equality and environmentalism, but she had stopped being as aggressive about it when she didn’t need to be. She stopped and did more research into what she was fighting for, she was much more knowledgeable about all kinds of discourse in a wide range of issues. She was full heartedly a feminist, a vegan, a socialist, and all sorts of other things. She had also come out as a lesbian a while back. The boys had been weirded out a first (I mean, come on, it was weird to think about Sam’s sexuality in the first place, let alone be thrown this curve ball) but they’d quickly gotten over it and supported her fully.

In fact, a few months afterwards Danny had made his own confession about liking boys just a little bit more than girls. He still liked girls… but boys were good too. He hadn’t had a crush on one in particular, it was just something that he realized one day, you know? He had been mulling over Sam’s confession and one thought led to another and the thought hit him. BAM. Bisexuality was a thing and that’s what he was. He had freaked out at first (that was almost an understatement) but he had since come to terms with it.

Sam had just smirked at him and said, “ _We gays gotta stick together, you know. Can’t let the heteros get us down_ ,” sneaking a mock glare at Tucker who just laughed it off. “ _Yeah we’re the worst_.”

Danny himself hadn’t changed much in height, it seemed he took after his mom rather than his dad, stature wise and was just barely taller than Sam. He had filled out a bit in muscle though. He was still slim, he just couldn’t gain bulk for some reason, but his muscles were still just on the side of noticeable. He had asked his mom for training in martial arts after all and she had been happy to oblige (it offering a good opportunity for mother/son bonding). So with that and ghost fighting, he stayed in pretty good shape.

He wore his usual jeans and t-shirt, though he had taken to wearing alien-themed meme shirts as well (they amused him okay? And he did love space) and on colder days he would just throw on a hoodie. He didn’t care much for fashion and he was lazy. It’s not like there was anyone he wanted to impress at school after all. When he bothered to dress up a little he had a (faux, Sam insisted) leather jacket that he wore with black jeans and slight v-necks.

He had matured some, they all had. It was just a part of growing up, but he was the same dork at heart. He traded horribly witty banter with ghosts during fights, he incessantly told puns to piss off his friends, and he still held that undying (ha) love for the stars.

Life had been pretty peaceful the past couple of years and it was nice.

But deep down Danny Fenton knew it couldn’t last forever.


	2. A New Threat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hahaha im on break for now you lucky ducks haaaaa. i could have written a nice, simple little romance but noooooooo i had to have this convoluted plot oiuhhghgh

> _"The ache for home lives in all of us. The safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned." - Maya Angelou_

Danny was running errands around town for his parents when he ran into a familiar face.

“Hey, babypop.”

“Ember?” Danny questioned. While it wasn’t rare to casually run into ghosts outside the zone, it wasn’t a common experience either. Ever since he had stopped fighting every single spirit to come through the portal, he had made peace with quite a few of them. Many of them could now interact in a much more tame manner with humans and were welcomed in Amity Park (it’s not like the citizens hadn’t been through stranger things) when they behaved themselves.

But this was different. Ember looked nervous and Danny thought he could see dust on her clothes and… was that a spot of ectoplasm?

“What happened? Were you in a fight?” Danny stepped closer in concern but didn’t know what to do after that.

“You could say that,” Ember looked away and nervously rubbed her arm before steeling herself and looking Danny in the eye with a determined expression, “Listen, Phantom, we’ve got a problem.”

Danny’s eyebrows raised in shock, “We do?”

Ember nodded, “Someone’s been out wrecking lairs but we don’t know who or even _what_ ,” she shifted her feet, looking anxious again, “And they aren’t the tiny caves of small fry either.”

Danny tightened his hold on the groceries in his hand. If someone was out destroying lairs… Then Ember was right, they had a problem. A big problem. Ghosts were territorial when it came to their homes and would fight tooth and nail to protect it, which meant someone with a great deal of power was likely behind this. Danny gestured for Ember to follow him as he headed back home so they could discuss this in private. Thankfully his parents were out at the moment and the townspeople had long since gotten used to seeing and interacting with ghosts, so they wouldn’t be too suspicious.

Ember followed him silently, tense from the threat still lurking in the Zone.

Danny unlocked the front door and disabled the minor anti-ghost shields that were constantly humming around the house and waved Ember inside. He set the groceries on the kitchen counter and dragged a chair out from under the counter, Ember taking the seat across from him.

Danny sighed, “So what happened?” Ember was too tense for this _not_ to be personal.

The ghost grit her teeth before starting, “You know I busk in the park a lot, right?”

Danny nodded. She had been doing that for a few months now, it allowed her a small boost of energy without having to brainwash anybody. People in the park also enjoyed her music from time to time. It was a win-win so no one bothered to try and stop her.

“I was leaving my lair the other day to do that, when I realized I had left some equipment so I doubled back to get it and…”

She looked down, hands hugging her arms in a protective gesture. Whatever had done this had really freaked her out.

“I was just gone for a few _minutes_ , babypop, and…” her voice wavered, “I got back and my lair was trashed. And I’m not talking about a night after a show kind of trashed, I mean my lair was in _pieces_.”

Danny was shocked at this point, the tough ghost in front of him was near to tears. He had never seen Ember this emotional before and it was almost scary to see her like this now.

“ _Pieces_ , Phantom,” she looked near broken, “My home is gone and it can’t be fixed.”

Danny ran a hand through his hair and took a deep breath. He stood up and started making tea (his mom always kept some in the top cabinet) for lack of a better thing to do. That’s what people did in situations like this though, right? Heavy, emotional conversation with tea to calm down? He didn’t really know what else to do anyway so might as well. Ember didn’t say a word both of them falling into silence as Danny paced the kitchen.

Grabbing some ectoplasm out of the fridge so Ember could actually drink the tea (ectoplasm was weird like that, ghosts could eat it and drink it but it was also their blood… Danny didn’t like to think too hard about it), Danny dropped two bags of chamomile mix into mugs filled with steaming hot water from the microwave. He gave one a heavy dose of ectoplasm and the other just a pinch.

He set one in front of Ember before breaking the silence, "And the ectoplasm on your clothes?"

She looked away, "I got a little scratched up digging through the rubble."

Danny sighed. “Do you have a place to stay?”

Ember nodded as she took the mug and took a few sips, “Yeah, my hunk of junk of a boyfriend is letting me stay at his place.”

Danny took his own sip of tea, the ectoplasm giving it a strange metallic taste, “Skulker’s island, huh?” Danny paused, thinking, “Isn’t that still pretty close to your… your old place?”

Ember’s eyebrows furrowed, “Yeah? What’s your point, babypop?”

Danny frowned in thought, he really didn’t like this…“Wouldn’t it have been… targeted too?”

Ember shook her head. “That’s one of the weird things about this. Whatever is destroying lairs is only going after buildings. My theatre, Dora’s castle, and even Johnny and Kitty’s place.”

Danny nearly spit out his tea, managing just to choke on it instead, “Wait- _Dora’s castle_ was destroyed?! But she- she’s a dragon! How?!”

Ember shook her head again, “Nobody knows. From what I heard the castle was there one minute and then boom, gone the next. Like I said Phantom, _minutes_.”

Danny ran another hand through his hair to try and calm himself. Ember really hadn’t been kidding when she said the thing wasn’t targeting small fries.

“Is everybody okay? Nobody was… _Ended_ , were they?” Danny nearly shuddered at the thought. While ghosts couldn’t technically die because they were already dead… their existence could still be wiped completely out. It wasn’t a nice thought.

“No,” Ember said quickly, also put off by the thought, “The few ghosts that were in the castle were able to phase out in time and Johnny and Kitty weren’t even home. The land Dora’s castle was on is still there so the town is just rebuilding it. Johnny and Kitty though…”

Danny glared down into his tea, “They can’t rebuild either?”

Ember looked down sadly, “No.”

The halfa drew in a deep breath and stood up, walking to the counter and placing his mug in the sink. “Alright. We’ll try and find a place for them to stay,” he turned back to face the other ghost, “It can’t be here, ghost hunters for parents and all, but I’ll go see if Clockwork knows if anybody has some extra room and if he knows anything about this thing going around and wrecking lairs.”

Ember stood as well, as Danny continued, “In the meantime, just ask around for a place they could crash in and keep an eye out for the weaker ghosts. There’s not much else we can do right now.”

The rocker ghost nodded before readjusting the guitar on her back, “Thanks, babypop.”

Danny smiled weakly, “You’re welcome,” there was a horrible screech outside that made Ember jump but the other teen wasn’t fazed, “that’ll be my parents, so you should probably go.”

Ember nodded and made her way down to the basement without another word. Danny took a moment to recollect himself after such disturbing news before walking to the foyer and switching the automatic ghost shields back on lest his parents ask questions he didn’t want to answer.

He stood there pensively for a moment, his parents making a racket outside still, before making a decision and heading down to the lab himself. He closed his eyes and let his ghost form take over, two bright rings spreading over his body and revealing his other form.

With a frown on his face he walked over to the ghost portal (which was almost always open nowadays) and gently placed a hand over the swirling green vortex. He had a really bad feeling about this new thing destroying the Zone, and entering it now almost seemed ominous.

Another deep breath and Danny Phantom flew off into the Ghost Zone, heading for his guardian Clockwork.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> until next time sweetlings!


	3. A Favor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *sobs* i burnt the macaroni and cheese for thanksgiving dinner

> " _Lost time is never found again_." - Benjamin Franklin

Danny was flying through the Zone with an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. There wasn’t much of a reason for the feeling, but that didn’t stop the slight sense of danger that was surrounding the Zone. He supposed it could be from that unknown threat from months ago. The attacks had mysteriously stopped and no one could figure out who (or _what_ ) it had been.

It was the reason Danny was still patrolling the Ghost Zone, looking for collapsed lairs, just in case.

Reaching the end of his usual route, Danny floated in the eerie atmosphere of the Zone, a small shiver going down his spine. It was hard being a halfa sometimes, here in the Zone he always felt a little creeped out, but back in the human realm he always felt like gravity was pulling on his shoulders too harshly. Constantly. It just reinforced the idea that he didn’t belong in either world and it sucked. He tended to ignore it and push the feeling away. There was nothing he could do about it anyway.

With a discontented sigh Danny pulled a few loops in the air for fun before shooting off to the Clock Tower, where his ghostly guardian lived.

Might as well see what CW was up to.

* * *

 

Danny landed in front of Clockwork’s lair a few minutes later, a soft chime, like that of a grandfather clock, announcing his arrival.

“Daniel! Come in, you’re just in time,” a deep voice and a small chuckle echoed from the tower itself.

Danny snorted and then turned intangible and floated into the building, being far too used to the Master of Time knowing when he going to show up.

“Hey, CW. What’re you up to now?” Danny questioned as he settled into an armchair inside the room Clockwork was in. Not as grand as the main room with the Mirrors of Time, but still impressive enough with the large crystal ball set in the floor in the center of the circular room.

“Nothing at the moment, young one,” Clockwork replied nonchalantly, not looking up from his gazing into the crystal.

“Okaaay,” Danny drawled out, confused, “then what was I just in time for?”

“Oh, yes!” the older ghost exclaimed, managing to tear his gaze away and look over at Danny, an almost wicked grin on his face, “I need you to do a favor for me.”

Danny narrowed his eyes in suspicion and crossed his arms over his chest, “Yeah, what kind of favor?”

“I need a book from the library,” Clockwork’s grin grew wider and Danny could almost _feel_ the amusement in his tone.

The halfa dropped his arms as his face scrunched up, “You want me to… go to the library?”

A simple, yet no less amused, “Yes.”

Danny crossed his arms again and stood up, “Why?”

Clockwork chuckled, “As I said before, to borrow a book.”

The younger ghost narrowed his eyes again, “Okaaay, but why do I have to get it? And what library? You’re up to something aren’t you?”

The other placed a hand against his chest, “Why, Phantom, you wound me. I am not up to anything. I am merely asking you to pick up a very important book for me as I am very, very busy.” The grin on Clockwork’s face hadn’t waned in the slightest.

“Uh huh,” Danny murmured before sighing, “Alright, fine, what book do you need?”

A piece of paper was in his hand before he could blink, “The title is on that,” Danny yelped when Clockwork suddenly started to push him out the door of the room, “Now, hurry on, young one. I am very busy and have much to do!”

“Hold on!” the other protested, “I still don’t know where to _get_ the book!”

The older ghost stopped, “Ah, yes, well. There is only one library in this area of the Zone…”

Danny narrowed his eyes, for some reason Christmas being the first thing to come to mind, “And that would be… where?”

“The Ghostwriter’s lair of course.”

“The Ghost-,” Danny whirled around to face his mentor, “You can’t be serious?!”

“As the dead, Daniel.”

Danny briefly resisted the urge to smack the other, who had a mock serious expression on his face. Puns were _his_ thing, dammit!

Trying not to acknowledge that terrible response, the teenage whined instead, “But that guy probably hates me! And he stuck me in a Christmas poem and made me rhyme! That’s probably the worst thing a ghost has ever done to me!”

“It’s been three years,” Clockwork tried to reason, grin back on his face. He already knew Danny would cave.

“So? That doesn’t change the fact he probably hates my guts.”

“You do not know that for certain. I’m sure an apology should suffice, if it worries you that much.”

Danny’s shoulders slumped, “Are you _sure_ you need this book, CW?”

A nod, “Quite certain,” Clockwork resumed gently pushing Danny out of his lair, “now off you go.”

The younger sighed before taking off, “Should’ve known you were up to something.”

The Master of Time chuckled as he watched his ward fly away, “Oh, but it’s much more that you think, Daniel.”

Clockwork turned back to the room with the crystal ball, all humor leaving him at the sight of it. He was going against Fate by doing this, but it was for Daniel’s own good.

_No it’s not…_ The thought was sinister in his head, _it’s for your own selfish gain just as much as it’s for his happiness. And you know very well that just because he’ll be happy doesn’t mean it’s what’s best for him…_

The Master of Time could not deny the doubts running through his mind but he also knew quite well that it was far too late to stop what he had begun. He had mulled over this dilemma for a very long time and had not made the decision lightly.

He gazed into the crystal, images flashing before his eyes. Many of the events would have been inevitable without this, but there were still so many that would come to pass because of it. All of this because of one… little book.

He placed a gloved hand upon the crystal, the images pausing on a dark shadow-like creature. A ghost never quite seen in this part of the Zone before, thrashing and screaming as a hand held it down. He slid his hand along the glass, the image changing with the motion. A crowd of ghosts chanting something in unison, growing more violent with every word. A very different Danny Phantom stood above them all, in the center of the crowd and looking grim. He changed the image again. A more familiar Danny lay in a bed, curled up in the blankets and looking completely catatonic. A shadow loomed over the boy and a hand appeared to rest on his shoulder. Vladimir Masters followed the hand from the shadow fluidly. Danny did not react. Clockwork took his hand from the crystal, the images running by and high speed again.

“All will be as it should be,” he whispered. Now he only hoped it would be true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> clockwork is a meddlesome lil shit


	4. An Apology

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Entshuldigung, bitte. Ich weiss klein Deutsch. Soo... thatll make sense for the chapter i promise um. wow so this is a pace i will nOT be able to keep up later. im on a mini-break rn and finals are comin up... but after that i should be crankin out chapters again cause of winter break. anyway, here we go!

> _"Libraries are our friends." - Neil Gaiman_

Danny was quietly talking to himself as he flew off towards the Ghostwriter’s lair.

“ _An apology will suffice_ ,” he mocked, “yeah, right. I’m gonna get blasted the moment I set foot in that guy’s place.”

Danny slowed his flying, “Didn’t Walker arrest him anyway, for breaking the truce that year?”

“Well, I mean… It’s been a while so he was probably released,” Danny stopped flying altogether, “He’s gotta be there, right? I mean CW wouldn’t send me on a pointless errand, would he?”

The halfa groaned, “He totally would.”

Nevertheless Danny continued his journey, his stomach doing flips from nerves all the while. Pros and cons. Pros: he gets the book CW (maybe) needs. Cons: Ghostwriter tries to kill him, Ghostwriter won’t let him borrow the book, Danny gets into yet another big mess and leaves empty handed. Yeah, that sounded fantastic.

Before the poor teen could work himself into more of a wreck, and before he could make the decision to flee, the lair of the Ghostwriter appeared before him. The stone lions in front of the door, prototypical of any library, seemed to glare at him menacingly, as if they knew what he had done to their master. Screw the book, he was leaving.

Then the Ghostwriter himself opened the doors and all chance of escape was lost.

“YOU!” the other ghost shouted angrily, pointing up at where Danny was still floating in front of his lair.

“Uhhh, hi?” Danny scrambled for words, not really knowing how to handle this situation. He had always had a “blast first, ask questions later” policy when it came to angry spirits.

“What are _you_ doing here?” the Ghostwriter questioned hotly, his deep voice sounding close to a growl. He crossed his arms over his chest, “Have you come to destroy _another_ one of my books?”

“No!” Danny shouted back, “I need to borrow one!”

“Borrow?” the other questioned, taken aback before recovering his temper, “Why should I let you anywhere near a book?”

“It’s not even for me! It’s for Clockwork!” Danny was frustrated, he didn’t really want to fight. He just wanted to get the book and go. And maybe give CW a good punch for making him do this.

“And why does that matter? Clockwork isn’t the one picking up the book, _you_ are,” Ghostwriter glared up at the halfa, “So, I reiterate, why should I let you _anywhere_ near my books?”

“Because I’m sorry?” Danny said miserably, having his past mistakes thrown in his face was not making him a happy camper.

“You’re sorry?” Ghostwriter whispered bitterly. “You didn’t seem so sorry when I got _arrested_.”

“Yeah, I know,” Danny rubbed the back of his neck. He really was sorry, even if he hadn’t done much to apologize. But how could he tell Ghostwriter that? He wasn’t very good with words.

“I destroyed your book and it was totally uncalled for. And on top of that, I ruined everyone’s Christmas that year, including yours I guess. You saw in the poem though! Christmas is just not a good time for me,” Danny slumped, “…but I still shouldn’t have done all that. And… I guess I could have apologized sooner.”

That was honestly the best he could do, and Ghostwriter could take it or leave it.

“That was the worst apology I’ve ever heard,” the other ghost sighed, “But I suppose it will do.”

“Really?!” Danny perked up, he didn’t think he’d actually be able to make amends with the other. He hadn’t exactly tried before, but you know, no time like the present. He’d probably have to do a lot more to get on the ghost’s good side but this was a start at least.

“For now,” the older narrowed his eyes, “You at least _seem_ contrite, and I do owe Clockwork a few favors. Now, get in here before I change my mind.”

With that the Ghostwriter turned on his heel and walked back into his library, Danny nervously followed behind. The sound of a soft violin filled the air.

“What… was that?”

Ghostwriter turned towards the other with an eyebrow raised, “That was Vidya, my lair. She was greeting you.”

“Oh,” was all he could say. Lairs could make noise like that?! Lairs could talk?! He thought back to the clock chime he always heard when he visited CW, and realized they probably could.

“Um, hello, Vidya?” Cheery notes like laughter echoed back to him, making him smile.

And suddenly the impact of a ghost losing their lair hit him in full. Oh god, lairs could talk. Were they, sort of… _alive_?! Even in part? Shit. No wonder Ember was so upset.

Ghostwriter gave him a searching look for his sudden change in mood, but dismissed it, “What book does the old _Master of Time_ , require?” The title of the older ghost dripping with acid from the other’s tone.

“Uh,” Danny searched for the piece of paper CW had shoved at him before remembering it was still in his hand (his jumpsuit didn’t come with pockets and it sucked). “This one?” he handed the slip over to the other ghost, not bothering to try and read it out.

Ghostwriter took the paper without comment, trying not to outright laugh at the teen’s flailing about. He looked down at the slightly blocky handwriting, “Hm, Vidya, can you search for a book called _Ich bin halb von ein tot Mann_?”

The violin trilled in affirmation before a transparent book popped into existence before the writer.

“Thank you, Vidya. Which shelf is it on?” The book morphed into an interior view of the library, rotating and highlighting a pathway towards a room in the back. Ghostwriter began strolling down the hallway, hands clutched behind his back and holograph gently floating before him. “Stay here, Phantom, and try not to hurt my books while I’m gone.”

“Okay, but-” was all Danny could get out before the other disappeared through a door. He was alone in the main hall of the library now and he didn’t know how to feel about it. He looked around.

The ceiling was higher than the average building and it made the moderate space seem grander than it really was, it was also a soft crème color, nothing too fancy, just relaxing. The floors were a shiny polished hardwood, covered in some areas by plush rugs. Cozy looking armchairs with outdated fabric designs and chunky wooden tabled dotted the open areas, sometimes with green-shaded lamps, unlit.

The walls were covered top to bottom with bookshelves, piled with books in a manner unusual to libraries. The books were shoved in the shelves to maximum capacity, sideways and diagonal, and even with the pages facing out instead of the spine. It almost looked like a puzzle within the stacks. There were probably hundreds of books in the first few shelves alone.

Whatever bit of wall wasn’t covered in bookshelves, floor to ceiling windows took up the space, offering the main source of light. It was odd, considering they were in the Ghost Zone the light should have been an eerie green, but it looked like soft sunlight. The kind of light you get right before the sun truly starts to set; a late afternoon glow like warm honey. There was nothing to see outside the windows either, just a blank whiteness. There was no hint of the Zone here.

The atmosphere was very calming and Danny found himself liking it here very much, going so far as to stop hovering and actually sink to the floor, shoulders dropping as well. While Danny’s life hadn’t been as hectic as it was before, it was still full of stress and anxiety and this place seemed to take a load off of his shoulders.

School was already a huge stressor, it being his senior year, and that threat that could still be lurking around the Zone didn’t help him either. Not to mention the ghosts that he _hadn’t_ made amends with, like Ghostwriter, and most memorably Walker. Some ghosts just couldn’t get over their obsession long enough to see reason.

The clicking of boots against hardwood announced Ghostwriter’s reappearance, an old book in hand and a contemplative frown on his face.

“I don’t know what that ass of a wristwatch wants with this _now_ of all times, but here it is,” he shoved it into the halfa’s hands, “now shoo.”

“Oh, um,” Danny fumbled with the thin journal-like book. He looked up, as the Ghostwriter was a few inches taller, and said sincerely, “Thanks, by the way.”

“I live in a library, Phantom, ghosts come here for books all the time,” Ghostwriter grumbled before turning around to head back into his lair.

“No,” Danny started, “I mean…” he rubbed at the back of his neck, “I mean for accepting my shitty apology.”

The other ghost paused and turned his head slightly to look back at the younger, “Yes, well. It’s not that big of a deal. The rewrite was better anyway.” And with that he stalked off, leaving Danny alone again.

“Is he always like that?” he asked of Vidya. Notes that went from high to low in staccato eighth-notes and sounded suspiciously like laughter were the only reply, making Danny smile.

“Guess I better get this to CW,” Danny flew off, looking back behind him to see the large oak doors slowly close. He’d have to come back sometime, if not to talk to Ghostwriter then at least to hang out with Vidya. It seemed really nice when he wasn’t worried about the other ghost killing him…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha so you COULD look up the translation for the title of the book OR you could not. up to you really. its just a itty bitty hint... ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Also! all credit for Vidya goes to ibeleiveinahappilyeverafter and spoopy-kasena. i just fell in love with their concept of Vidya and lairs! (even if this version is a bit different)


	5. A Choice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woooooooooooooooow so ha, i had to delete like 350 words of a scene bc reasons and i hated myself for it but yeah i cant believe im still keeping up this pace like wooow anywaaaay i keep forgetting to give yall my tumblr if ya want it. im gonna start posting chapters there too and feel free to ask me questions! ya dont have to follow if ya dont wanna but hey its always appreciated! so are comments and kudos btw! love em and love you guys!! tumblr is nabtime at the tumblr dot com :D

> _"It is our choices, Harry, that show us who we truly are, far more than our abilities." - Albus Dumbledore (J.K.R.)_

The house was pleasantly warm when Danny woke up the next morning after his visit to the Ghostwriter. The halfa curled further into blankets and a contented sigh slipped through his lips. Sleep still clung to his body, making his limbs blissfully heavy and his mind a soft haze. It was Sunday and he didn’t have anything to worry about today so he could laze in bed for as long as he liked. The perfect morning, even as worried thoughts reentered his brain. He recalled the conversation he had with Clockwork just before giving him the book.

* * *

 

_“Hey old man, I got your book!” Danny called into the Tower as he searched for the Master of the lair._

_“Clockwork?” Danny could usually find him in the Room of Mirrors but he didn’t seem to be anywhere._

_“In here, Daniel,” a calm voice called from the room below._

_Danny turned intangible and sunk through the floor to appear above the meddling Master of Time. The room was yet another Danny had never seen in the Tower, circular like the others but with absolutely no windows. The only light in the room was a faint blue glow around the top edge where wall met ceiling, with no discernable source._

_What was inside caught his breath. A large, also circular, waterfall appeared to fall from the ceiling and disappear into the floor. There was nothing to interrupt the stream of water, it was steady and clear but also shimmering from constant movement. The blue light from the rim of the room cast it in a stunning glow. Inside the circle of water however, was what really caught the halfa’s attention. Images from the Time Stream. Past, present, and future all flowing and bouncing together like the rapids of a shallow river, even as the actual water surrounding it was never disturbed._

_Danny had no idea how Clockwork could actually make anything out of the tumultuous visions, until they suddenly stopped, focusing on a certain fruitloop’s face._

_Danny watched silently as it played through the accident that gave Vlad his powers all those years ago. He watched as it displayed, without sound, Vlad laying in the hospital covered in horrible boils and face scrunched up in immense pain. He watched as it suddenly jumped to an older looking Vlad forlornly running his fingers along the wall of his empty mansion as he walked down a darkened hallway, his back to the vision and face hidden. He watched as it jumped again to what he assumed was the present._

_Vlad hadn’t attacked Amity Park or played out any of his plans in months and Danny had had the hope that maybe he was done with his sick obsession. But he should have known better as he watched the current Vlad leaning over a very life-like robotic version of his mother._

_Danny gave a disgusted scoff at the vision before him and the river-flow of glimpses into time resumed their chaotic rush._

_Clockwork sighed as turned to face his ward, “It will work itself out in time, young one.”_

_“Work itself out?” Danny scoffed again, “Yeah, you wanna tell me how?”_

_The elder ghost rubbed at his temples, “Vladimir will fail to build a robot that holds to his standards. Circumstances that I cannot reveal to you will then cause him to never go after you or your family again. That is all you need to know.”_

_Danny was taken aback by the prompt and clear response, Clockwork almost never told him anything about the future straight out like that. “Never?”_

_The other nodded with a neutral face, “Never.”_

_“You’re not gonna tell me what makes him stop, are you?” Danny trusted Clockwork, he trusted the other ghost with his life, but he didn’t trust Vlad, and things have happened before that took the Master of Time by surprise. Who’s to say that Vlad would be any different?_

_“No, Daniel, I cannot. But that is not what we are here to discuss,” Clockwork suddenly grinned at him and his next question was full of smug amusement, “Did your apology suffice, young one?”_

_Danny rolled his eyes and huffed at his guardian, “Yeah, yeah, I get it. No need to rub it in, old man.”_

_Clockwork chuckled and Danny handed over the book he had been sent to collect in the first place._

_“Thank you,” the older ghost said simply before quietly humming in thought. “This may take longer than first assumed.”_

_“What’s gonna take longer?” Danny questioned, curious about the thin and dusty book his guardian was puzzling over._

_“Translation,” the elder replied, flipping through the pages sedately. “But that is something to worry about at a later time. For now, we have lessons to go over.”_

_Danny groaned._

* * *

 

The revelation still weighed heavy in his head, still suspicious of Vlad’s plans even with Clockwork’s reassurances but there was nothing more he could do about it until Vlad actually did something, so he pushed his worries aside for now. Instead he concentrated on the sweet (and not burnt for once) smell of breakfast wafting up from the kitchen downstairs. Mm, pancakes? Maybe waffles.

His parents must be taking a break from their inventions.

“Danny, sweetie,” a voice called from behind his door with a light knock, “I made some breakfast if you’re up.”

“M’kay, Mom,” he called back as loudly as he could with his voice still thick with sleep, “I’ll be out in a minute!”

“Alright, hon, just don’t wait too long,” her voice faded and light footsteps sounded as she walked away from his door, but he could still hear her grumble, “if you do, your father might eat it all.”

Danny laughed at the comment but promptly got out of bed knowing it was true. He got casual clothes together to change into for the day, just some sweatpants and an old shirt, and carried into the bathroom to change into after a shower. He had absolutely nothing he had to do today and it felt fantastic. All his homework was done and he had no other obligations. _And_ he wouldn’t have to make his own breakfast today.

Danny showered quickly, brushing his hair and teeth in a rush, and hurried downstairs to grab some breakfast before it was gone.

“Good morning, sweetie!” his mother called as he slid into the dining area of the kitchen.

“Morning Mom, morning Dad,” he cheerfully greeted back as he thumped into a chair and started piling food onto a plate (pancakes, yes!).

“Moring, Danny!” his father said enthusiastically as he finished up the pancake on his own plate, “Got anything exciting to do today, champ?”

“Not really-,” Danny began but was promptly cut off by his father’s excited reply.

“Great! You wouldn’t mind helping us out in the lab would you, Danny?” the son didn’t even get to reply before he continued, “Of course not! We can get some bonding time in while we show you how our latest anti-ghost weapon works! You’ll love it, son!”

Danny huffed good-naturedly as Jack proceeded to blather on about ghosts again. He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up at the apologetic face of his mother.

“You don’t really mind, do you, Danny?” she squeezed his shoulder in comfort, “You don’t have to if you don’t want to, honey.”

He smiled to alieve her worry, “I don’t mind, Mom. I _would_ kinda like to see what you guys are up to in the lab.”

And he really didn’t mind either. Yes, he had planned to do nothing that day but lay in bed and relax, but honestly? He’d probably get bored in the first few minutes and end up riding around town or meeting up with Sam and Tucker and he hadn’t spent much time with his parents recently. It would probably be a pain, their inventions sticking to him or attacking him but it was worth it, plus he got to see what they did and learn to avoid them _before_ they attacked him in his ghost form. Win-win in the long run.

“Great!” his mother smiled, “We’ll head down after breakfast then!”

* * *

 

Clockwork sighed as he watched Danny interact with his family from one of his many mirrors. He was happy for now, but it would not last. And it was partly Clockwork’s fault. There were many, many alternative timelines that could come to pass without his interference and many others had he pushed the young halfa in a different direction. They were no longer in the Alpha timeline, they had _long_ since diverged from that path, but he no longer cared.

“This is the right decision. This is the right path,” he whispered to himself, alone in his lair. His hand clenched around his staff. “ _It has to be_.”

While this line of events would bring Danny the most happiness in the end, it would also bring him pain. Pain he could eventually surmount, yes, but pain nonetheless. He would have to suffer before he could have bliss. But deep down Clockwork knew his actions weren’t fueled just by Danny’s ultimate happiness. He had a more selfish reason. One he held close to his ticking heart.

This was one of the very few timelines that Danny could have his happiness, and the _only_ timeline Vladimir Masters could be released from his sinister obsession. The only one where _both_ of them could be happy.

He turned to face a different mirror, watching as a black, shadow-like ghost made its way across the Zone. Fast and terrifying, as it left complete destruction in its wake. Soon it would reach its destination and all would come to pass that would need be.

And Clockwork would do nothing to stop it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh hoho? dear clockwork are you actually infallible or are you letting your emotions get in the way, hmmmm? haaaha do you hate me yet cause its only gonna get worse~! anyway byeeeeeeee!


	6. A Message

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haaaaa i had to write an essay today so this took me longer :(((( also i like to use italics for emphasis a little bit more than i should but eh... anyway, ye you guys enjoy!

> _"Trains, like time and tide, stop for no one." - Jules Verne_

_Dusk was approaching and rain was tapping away at the propped open window, letting the gentle song of a late autumn shower be heard. All Danny could see was the window, and through it, a courtyard surrounded by brick buildings with yellow-leaved trees and a single bench. The forlorn and eerie whistle of a train echoed out to him. It was comparable to the wail of a lonely ghost._

_Suddenly he could hear the thuds of the train on the tracks, distant but distinct. Clack-clack, clack-clack, clack-clack. He could no longer see through the window, there was only a grey fog, too dense. The train cried out again, shrill and piercing. Getting closer…_

_Clack-CLACK, clack-CLACK, clack-CLACK. The sounds grew louder in an instant, a demanding rumble._

_The whistle of the train was at its loudest, as if the train were right in front of him though the clacking never stopped. Fear shivered down Danny’s spine as the whistle blew, deafening and furious, and the clacking grew faster._

_There came a whisper underneath it all, “You must stop_ it _. You must, you must.”_

_It joined the chorus of the train, repeating in rhythm with the tracks, “You must,” clack-CLACK, “you must!”_

_“Before it’s too late.”_

_And suddenly the roar of train was too much, intense and wailing and angry. Danny felt like he would die for good as the train would bowl him over, it was so close and so loud and his heart was beating triple time, it hurt and-_

_CLACK-CLACK, CLACK-CLACK, CLACK-CLACK_.

Danny woke up.

He was sitting straight up in bed though he didn’t remember moving. He couldn’t focus on anything and his heart was still beating loud and fast.

He had a nightmare. But what was it about…?

Soon the adrenaline began to dissipate and his heart resumed its slower-than-normal thudding. His dream dissolved to mist and all he could remember of it was the distant echo of a train whistle.

Slowly, Danny reached over for his phone, checking the time. He blinked at the numbers that read out, 6:43 am. He groaned. It was too early to be awake but too late to go back to sleep when he’d have to wake up for school soon anyway. What a wonderful start to a Tuesday.

Danny whined as he flung the covers away from his body and slowly clambered out of bed. He had learned to cherish sleep all those months that he had gotten less of it. Sleep was precious and he hated waking up in the mornings.

He grumbled through his entire morning routine. Stretch and limber up for the day (honestly he had pulled one-to-many muscles while fighting ghosts to _ever_ forget to stretch in the mornings), and maybe pull a few half-assed sit-ups and push-ups (don’t judge him like that, he’ll work out more in the afternoon, sheesh he just woke up for goodness sake).

After a shower, teeth brushing, and a change of clothes, Danny stood in front of the mirror glaring at himself. There were slight bags under his eyes, a near constant in his appearance has he continuously could not get enough sleep in his life. His hair was also starting to grow out, not as any fashion statement, but merely because he was too lazy to get it cut. It was also easier to fight when it was like this as his bangs never got in his face anymore from their length.

Danny grabbed a brush and roughly pulled it through his hair. Just because it was easier to maintain didn’t mean it wasn’t as messy and untamable as before. He grimaced as he pulled at a knot, mood growing more irritated by the moment. Eventually he brushed out all the kinks and grabbed a black hair tie to pull it back with. Most days he kept his hair in a small ponytail at the nape of his neck, so he wouldn’t have to deal with it. He was too lazy to really do anything else with it.

Danny left the bathroom with a sigh and settled onto the floor of his bedroom, making sure to turn off the lights and close the door as he went in.

He crossed his legs and let hands fall limp into his lap.

Meditation was something Clockwork had taught him and encouraged him to do often. Since he had nothing better to do until he had to leave for school, he might as well calm down with meditation.

He breathed slowly, in and out, and let his shoulders drop and muscles relax. Just like Clockwork showed him. Recently, over the past few months at least, CW had taken his role as Danny’s guardian more actively, inviting him over to the Tower often and scheduling lessons where he taught the younger ghost various things. CW had taught him relaxation techniques, how ghosts worked, tidbits about time and events from history, and all sorts of things about the Ghost Zone itself. The halfa generally enjoyed these lessons even if he pretended to complain. Clockwork always saw right through his grouching anyway.

Danny was just taking another deep breath, his irritation from the early wake-up call only just leaving him when he heard shouting from downstairs, instantly putting him back in a bad mood.

He could hear his parents clearly from his room.

“WE GOT A LIVE ONE, MADS!”

“Fantastic, Jack! Let’s take it down to the lab!”

_Who had they caught_ now? he thought angrily as he lept to his feet and pulled open his door. And how was he going to distract them long enough to set the bugger free?

If there was one thing about his parents he disliked, it was their continued belief that all ghosts were evil and up to no good. It always hurt to hear them going on and on about the ills of ghosts _when he was sitting right there, dammit_. The rest of town had already gotten the memo and had passively allowed the less rambunctious ghosts to float about the town, so long as they didn’t cause any trouble. But his parents? They were still merciless, convinced that the ghosts were trying to lure them into a false sense of security. It was the one thing Danny would fight tooth-and-nail over with his parents and he hated it.

He thumped down the stairs in a rush hoping to catch his parents before they made it to the lab. They spotted him first as he skidded into the hall just before the stairs leading to the basement.

“Hey, Danny!” his father called out, a glowing cage held under one arm and the other waving energetically at his son.

Danny didn’t reply to his father, focused instead on the ghost inside the cage. They had _Cujo_ of all ghosts and the dog was whimpering in fear and cowering in the corner. It made Danny’s blood boil.

“Let him go,” he growled before he could catch himself.

His father looked put out but his mother looked angry, narrowing her eyes at her son and reprimanding him, “Danny, don’t you start this again.”

“ _Me_?” Danny raised his voice, “Cujo hasn’t done a _damn_ thing and you’re the ones about to _rip him apart_ for no reason!”

“ _Language_ , young man!” his mother snapped, “Ghosts are malignant creatures that will hurt anything that gets in their way, you _know_ that Danny!”

“ _No_ ,” he snarled, hands clenching into fists as he stood before his parents, “I do not _know_ that. And neither do you! You have _no proof_ that all ghosts are evil and you’re HURTING the ones that aren’t!”

His mother scoffed, hands on her hips, “Ghosts can’t feel anything, Danny-“

He cut her off by yelling, “YES _THEY DO!_ YOU JUST DON’T WANT TO BELIEVE IT!”

“NO,” his mother was yelling back, “THEY DO _NOT!_ Honestly, Danny, where do you even get the idea? Your father and I are going down to that lab,” here she pointed to the stairs with a rigid finger, “and using this ghost for research whether you like it or not!”

Something in Danny snapped, he was tired of this. He was tired of fighting with his parents about this because they just _wouldn’t understand_. He didn’t want to see Cujo hurt. He was just a puppy. He didn't deserve that.

“No,” he growled lowly, “you _won’t_.”

“ _Excuse_ me?” he mother said, taken aback.

But Danny didn’t reply he simply walked up to his father and snatched the cage right out of the shocked man’s arms. His father hadn’t said a word during the entire argument, he rarely did. Jack didn’t try to stop him either. Just let him walk out the door, with Cujo safely tucked under his arms, yipping happily at seeing Danny. His mother was yelling at him but he didn’t care to listen.

He slammed the door behind him and ran to the nearest deserted alleyway where he quickly transformed. He was still seething and all he wanted to do was escape into the Ghost Zone.

He turned invisible and then intangible and flew back through his house, over his parents’ now arguing heads. Jack looked serious and was speaking quietly with his wife with a frown but Maddie had her hands on her hips and was snapping at her husband. Danny didn't stop to listen and simply slipped into the open portal in the lab.

He released Cujo from the cage, who gave him a happy lick before running off, and then aimlessly flew further into the Zone. He had no idea where he wanted to go or where he would end up, just that he wanted to _leave_. He _needed_ to leave, be as far away from the hurt his parents unwittingly caused as possible.

So he flew.


	7. A Conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BOY HOWDY haha my last day of classes are tomorrow and its a good thing i can just zone out in all of them like jimminy christmas guys this fic has RUINED my sleeping schedule. ANYWAY have basically twothousand words of fluffstuff

> _"There's a sorrow and pain in everyone's life, but every now and then there is a ray of light that melts the loneliness in your heart and brings comfort like hot soup and a soft bed." - Hubert Selby Jr., Requiem for a Dream_

Danny was beyond pissed and he didn’t know what to do with all the anger boiling in the pit of his stomach. He had calmed down from the flight around the Ghost Zone but not by much. He needed to meditate somewhere because he knew releasing his anger physically when he was this worked up was not a good idea. He’d end up hurting himself or someone else.

Honestly, though, he was surprised he could still think straight to a degree. This wasn’t the first time he had had this same argument with his parents but this _was_ the first time it had left both him and his mom screaming.

Danny flew without direction, cursing his mother’s stubbornness in his head, his anger still inarticulate.

Moments later he spotted a familiar lair and the warmth he felt at the sight of it, while not enough to touch the fire in his mind, was still noticeable nevertheless. The Ghostwriter’s Library.

He had been back only twice in the week or so since his first apology and both Vidya and her Master grew on him each time. He and the Ghostwriter didn’t have lengthy conversations, it was mostly just him pestering the other ghost with questions; questions about lairs, about Vidya specifically, and about the Ghost Zone in general. The older ghost knew quite a bit about everything and Danny had always been a curious person. Ghostwriter also may have gotten irritated with him but he always answered Danny’s questions and was generally kind if a bit grumpy (he held grudges for quite some time it seemed).

Danny touched down on the stone steps between the lions keeping guard and tried to reign in his fury. There was no need to inflict it upon others who didn’t deserve it, especially when he was still on somewhat rocky ground with the other.

The large wooden doors opened for him and Vidya greeted him with a happy trill that made him smile briefly.

“Hello to you too, Vidya,” he couldn’t help but greet back.

“Phantom?” the Ghostwriter called from the room just beyond the front foyer.

Danny walked through the large lobby-ish space and past the open doors that led to the main part of the library, which was even grander and more opulent. The first time he had seen it the room had taken his breath away.

The windows were taller here, almost two stories high and the ceiling they reached towards was arched and painted like a cathedral. The floors were marble and reflected the empty sunlight in a mesmerizing way. There was still nothing to be seen outside the windows besides sunlight but that hardly mattered when it contrasted so beautifully with the delicate black framing. The bookshelves reached the ceiling as well, tall sliding ladders dotted about the place so one could reach the highest books. The books were placed in them in the same peculiar puzzle-piece way as they had been in the lobby.

Sturdy wooden tables and plush leather chairs, as well as green-glassed desk lamps and high-backed desk chairs, were littered about the room for those who wished to settle down, along with the occasional couch. They did not occupy the center of the room, however, as the space was covered with an intricately pattered rug and the floor itself was sunken down a few steps. Pillows dotted the area instead, creating a cozy circle.

It was an entirely different library from room to room and Danny loved it. Even if reading wasn’t particularly his favorite pastime, he could still appreciate the grandeur and the sense of awe the library inspired. It was part of the reason he had decided to land here when he saw the building.

“Hey, GW,” he said as he spotted the ghost floating around and shelving books.

The Ghostwriter had prepared to snap at the other for using that ridiculous nickname but stopped at the flat tone Phantom used. Something was wrong with the usually cheerful ghost, so instead he calmly asked, “What brings you here, Phantom?”

The young halfa didn’t say anything at first, his shoulders hunching and arms crossing over his chest protectively, “Can I- Do you mind if I just- if I just chill here? Like, just sit here or something?”

The older ghost waved an arm to gesture to his lair, holding back his questions and curiosity. “Be my guest,” he answered neutrally.

Danny sighed and his shoulders dropped, “Thanks.”

He stalked off the center of the room and plopped down on the floor assembling him limbs into his usual meditation pose. Ghostwriter watched him without comment before returning to shelving books.

Danny took a deep breath and let his ghost form float a few feet off the ground. It was always fun to meditate as a ghost. He tried to focus his thoughts, to concentrate on the room around him, and the calming atmosphere of the place helped a bit but his thoughts were still a jumble and his stomach still in twists. His thoughts kept circling back to the argument. He just couldn’t believe his mother would want to hurt _Cujo_ , an innocent puppy, of all ghosts.

Why was his mother so damn stubborn?

Why did she refuse to see the truth about ghosts? Yeah, there were some pretty rotten ghosts out there but not all of them were evil! Where did she even get the idea when neither of his parents had even studied an _actual ghost_ up close? Why did she so staunchly hold on to her beliefs even when faced with countless pieces of evidence otherwise? What made ghosts so evil in their minds? Why- did they think _he_ was evil? Because… if she was so willing to rip apart small dog like Cujo- rip him apart molecule by molecule- then what would she be willing to do to _him_? _And why did the thought have to hurt so much? Why did he have to be afraid of his own fucking parents?!_

Danny was so caught up in his turmoil, his meditation having backfired on him strongly, that he didn’t notice Ghostwriter’s presence right in front of him.

He did notice though, his eyes shooting open, when two hands landed on his shoulders. He looked up into toxic green eyes as his legs unfolded to firmly place him on the ground.

“What?” he questioned of the other, not knowing what to make of his sudden appearance.

“You’re crying,” Ghostwriter said quietly. It was the first time Danny had ever heard him speak so softly, and with such concern.

Danny wiped a hand across his face, shocked to find tears there. He obviously hadn’t known he was crying. “I- uh, sorry,” he bit out, trying to wipe away the evidence. How lame was it to start crying all of a sudden? Wow, Danny, way to go. What, are you gonna start sobbing on the guy’s shoulder, next? Hah, pathetic.

“Don’t be,” the hands on his shoulders squeezed, reminding him they were there, “Do you wish to tell me what’s wrong? You came to _my_ library after all.”

Danny looked away from the other, not being able to stand the concern in his eyes, “Not really.”

The Ghostwriter took a moment to respond, trying to read the younger ghost before him. Phantom was not so bad once he had made the effort to apologize for ruining his work and he had warmed up to the teen, enjoying the curious questions he was pelted with when he visited, even if he tried not to show it. He found a simple joy in teaching and sharing knowledge, he had wanted to become an educator at one point after all. Phantom was also an amusing presence and he found he missed the other when he left, even after just three visits. He didn’t like to see the man so sad and upset.

“Are you sure?”

It was Danny’s turn to pause. He needed an outlet for this frustration and fear and if Ghostwriter was willing to listen… He took a deep breath and plunged right in before he could rethink the decision, “I’m a half ghost and my parents are ghost hunters,” he shrugged, jostling the hands off his shoulders- a move he regretted when he lost their strange comfort- “that pretty much sums it up.”

The Ghostwriter nodded before grabbing Danny’s wrist and pulling him over to a couch, pushing him down onto the leather before sitting down next to the halfa himself.

“What has upset you, today, specifically,” Ghostwriter relaxed back into the couch, getting comfortable. Danny slowly followed suit.

“My mom, she- She yelled at me today. I mean, I yelled at her first, don’t get me wrong,” Danny waved his hands in front of him, “But she-,” he collapsed against the sofa, “She just won’t believe that ghosts are anything but evil,” at this Danny curled up in a self-consciously on the cushions. “And that hurts, you know? Because _I’m_ a ghost so to them- to my _parents_ , I must be… evil.”

Danny’s voice dropped into a whisper, “And I try so hard not to be. I don’t want to be- I _can’t_ be evil. I won’t let myself be like _him_. But-,” his voice cracked with emotion, “But what if I _am_?”

“You are not,” Ghostwriter gripped the younger man’s shoulders again, firmly. He didn’t fully understand this sudden urge to reassure the other but he couldn’t ignore it either, not with Phantom in so much pain in front of him, “If there is one thing I know for certain about you, Danny Phantom, it is that you are the _furthest_ thing from evil there is.”

Danny’s eyes widened at the passion in the other man’s voice.

“Your mother is simply set in her ways and is blind to anything else. She cannot see the truth when she does not want to. That is _not_ your fault,” Ghostwriter’s glasses slipped down his nose a tiny bit as he tilted his head down, moving closer to Phantom’s face, “You are _not_ evil and you should never think of yourself as such.” He leaned back and dropped his hands into his lap. “Maybe she will come to see this, maybe not. But I hope she does.”

Danny took in Ghostwriter’s words and let himself relax. He was still angry at his mother, the previous burn had turning into a simmer, nothing unmanageable, but he was no longer upset. If the Ghostwriter of all people, someone who had every reason to hate him even still, was willing to tell him he wasn’t evil, then maybe he could believe it too.

“Thanks, GW,” he mumbled hoarsely, voice still thick from crying.

The other frowned at him, “Andrew,” he said.

“What?” Danny asked him in surprise.

“Stop calling me GW,” he said testily, “I have a name. It’s Andrew.”

Danny grinned cheekily, “Alright, Andy.” Andrew huffed and fell back against the couch in defeat, Danny’s laugh following and ringing out in the airy library pleasantly. He smiled, knowing he had successfully cheered the other up.

“You have to call me Danny, then,” he said with a bright smile as he pointed a finger at the other.

“I do not _have_ to do anything you tell me to, _Daniel,_ ” Andrew shot back with a matching grin.

“I can’t believe you would be so _cruel_ , Andy! That was a low blow,” Danny’s laugh ruined the mock indignation he had tried to muster.

The banter continued from there, the two men just laughing and enjoying each other’s company. Woes were but aside for a time as one got to know the other in the extravagant library and vise versa.

Danny would never regret going to Andrew’s lair that day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :D


	8. A Question

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haaa okay so importan PSA! Finals are coming up and i need to study. so updates will slow and be sporadic if they happen at all until Finals are over which will be the 9th. I will be going home on the 10th so updates will pick back up after that. BUT here's the important part. im afraid ill get lazy and lose steam on this fic and i dont want that. SO. if i haven't posted a new chapter by the 13th you have my express permission to YELL AT ME. whether its on here or on my tumblr, just. guilt trip me into writing again pls. ANYWAY.. heres the chapter *jazz hands*

> _"It is not flesh and blood but the heart that makes us fathers and sons." - Johann Schiller_

It wasn’t until hours later that Danny finally made his way out of the Ghost Zone and back home. He had left relatively early in the day so it was only just past noon and he hoped his parents were down in the lab so he could slip into the house without being noticed. He had skipped school after all and he wasn’t in for lecture right after a fight.

No such luck, he saw as he drifted through the portal and into the lab. They weren’t there.

With a frown he phased through the wall and flew up to the street beside his house, changing back into his human form in the alleyway after checking for any wayward eyes.

He cautiously walked up the steps of his house and opened the door. It was unlocked so that meant they were still home. He only prayed they didn’t see him until he could hole up in his room.

Again he was out of luck.

“Skipping school, Danny?” his father said wearily from his seat at the kitchen table.

Danny didn’t want to look him in the eye so he kept his head down, his hand gripping the door frame between the entryway and the kitchen. He shrugged.

His father sighed before gesturing for Danny to come closer, “We need to talk, son.”

Danny reluctantly trudged into the room and sat down across from his father at the small kitchen table. He grabbed one arm with his hand and slunk down into the seat.

He wasn’t angry anymore and he certainly wasn’t angry with his dad, but he didn’t want to have this talk. He dad was going to be calmer about this, which he appreciated, but that didn’t change the subject matter. That ghosts were evil and he needed to understand that. That also didn’t change the strangeness of his dad being the one to sit him down like this. Usually his mother was the one that was calm and levelheaded about everything. That left him confused and upset and wary of a conversation with his dad. All things he did not want to be.

The two sat silently in the darkened kitchen, weak sunlight being the only lighting, setting everything into a strange contrast. His dad looked tired and solemn, like a lot of things were weighing down his thoughts. Danny could relate to that.

Jack Fenton didn’t know what to do with his quiet son. He was worried. He didn’t know what to do. So he spoke.

“What’s gotten into you, lately, Danny boy?”

Danny looked up in surprise, catching his father’s concerned gaze, before shrugging again.

Jack frowned at the noncommittal response, “Your mother and I…”

Danny flinched internally when the sentence trailed off, holding his breath for the rest of it. Was his father going to say he was a disappointment because he couldn’t agree with them? Did they think him an awful son? Was this the part his dad started blathering about how ghosts were evil? _Did they know he was keeping secrets?_ The thoughts were lightning fast and very brief, but they still filled his head with dread and doubt.

Jack continued without noticing his son’s struggle, “Your mother and I love you very much. You do know that, don’t you, Danny?”

Danny’s racing thoughts slowed and his defensive posture dropped. He did know that, deep down, but it was hard to remember sometimes with everything happening.

“Even,” he rubbed at the back of his neck, “even when we don’t agree about ghosts?”

Jack nodded firmly, “Even then. We’ll love you no matter what, son. Maddie may get heated about ghost morality, and she has her reasons for that, but she still loves you. And so do I, Danny. We’re Fentons. And the Fenton family always sticks together! Right, son?”

Danny smiled at his father, feeling much better, “Yeah, dad.”

Jack smiled back and stood up exuberantly, knocking the chair back in his usual enthusiasm, “Good! Now it’s fudge time!”

Danny laughed. 

* * *

 

 

He was relaxing back against his pillows, hands behind his head and aimlessly staring up at the poster of space he had pinned to the ceiling above his bed. Sam was flipping through a textbook, sitting cross-legged on the floor and leaning against his bed. Tucker was fiddling with some new technological gadget at Danny’s desk.

All three of them, having been friends for years and years now, had come to appreciate mutual silence. It was nice, to have them there, but not force anyone to come up with something to talk about. They were already so intertwined with each other’s lives, being in school together and then being around each other all the time afterwards, that they already knew everything about each other. There was nothing to talk about and that was okay.

Danny was able to just relax and think. He thought about a lot of things. About what Clockwork had taught him last, which was how ghost lairs truly worked. They didn’t have lessons that often so it had been the first opportunity he had remembered to ask the other ghost about Vidya and if lairs were sentient since they could communicate.

Lairs aren’t that simple, Clockwork had explained to him, they had “souls” of their own in a sense, but they also weren’t alive in the same way humans or even ghosts were. Lairs were “born” in the Zone along with the ghost, they were a part of the ghost. A deep gong had reverberated around the room when Clockwork had said that, his lair agreeing with him.

“ _Also_ ,” the Master of Time had gone on to say gently, “ _lairs do not ‘die’ if they are destroyed_.”

Danny had been relieved to hear that and Clockwork had smiled at him knowingly.

Lairs, he learned, were so much a part of the ghost they were born with that if the physical part of the land were destroyed then so long as the ghost was still “alive” it would continue to exist until a new, permanent, residence could be found. Which meant Ember and Johnny 13 and Kitty wouldn’t have _completely_ lost their homes.

Lairs could also be combined, which he found interesting to know. It would explain how Johnny and Kitty could live in the same place without having two lairs. Ember would likely end up adding the sentient part of her lair to Skulker’s and build a place on his island.

He wondered what his lair would be like if he had one. _If_ he had one, as he had also asked Clockwork about that and the other’s reply was that he would just _know_ if he had one so if he didn't know then he didn't have one. He supposed being only half-ghost didn’t qualify him for a home in the Zone. But his would be awesome if he did have one. Probably.

Danny tilted his head in Sam’s direction when the girl huffed and slammed the textbook she was holding, shut. “I hate history sometimes,” she groused.

Tucker nodded sagely, not looking up from his tinkering, “You and me both.”

“You’re not even the one studying for the test we have!” she shot back with a glare.

Tucker raised an eyebrow and pointed his tiny screwdriver at her, “The test that is _next week_.”

She crossed her arms before grumbling, “It doesn’t hurt to be prepared, you know.”

Tucker shrugged and didn’t comment. Sam huffed again before turning to Danny, “And what have _you_ been thinking about so seriously over there, space cadet?”

Danny shrugged, “Lairs.”

Sam narrowed her eyes, “Is that what Clockwork’s been teaching you about lately?”

“Yeah.”

Sam almost growled. She was trying to have a _conversation_ dammit. She wanted to stop thinking about her history test and talking with her friends was the way to do it. But they wouldn’t talk. _Boys_.

“Hey,” her eyes lit up as she thought of something to talk about, “you never told us how your talk with Ghostwriter went!”

Tucker looked up, interested in the topic as well, “Yeah, Sam’s right, you just complained about how Clockwork is always messing with you.”

Danny blushed at the thought of the last time he had been at the other ghost’s lair, after his parents fight, and how he had practically sobbed into Andrew’s shoulder. He hadn’t told Sam and Tucker about the fight, it was a pretty common occurrence anyway, so he hadn’t mentioned flying off to Ghostwriter’s lair to them either. He hadn’t meant to leave them in the dark about his growing friendship with GW, it had just happened.

“It went pretty fine,” he sat up to talk to the two better, “Andrew’s pretty cool to hang out with when he’s not, you know, wanting to kill me or something.”

“Andrew?” Sam questioned with a raised eyebrow.

“That’s his name,” Danny replied, not knowing what the look in her eyes meant.

“Must have went better then fine if you’re on a first name basis now,” Tucker grinned at him.

Danny shrugged, for some reason trying to fight off a blush. “I dunno.”

Sam soon joined Tucker in grinning, “Is he cute?”

“What?!” Danny squeaked, embarrassingly enough.

“You heard me,” Sam was sitting beside him on the bed now, leering at him, “Is. He. Cute.”

Danny could see Tucker giving him the same look out of the corner of his eye, “Yes?!” He immediately backtracked in mortification, “No!” He shoved his face into his hands, “I don’t know!”

He hadn’t really thought about it but he supposed it was true. Andrew wasn’t _unattractive_ and he was nice when he wasn’t being grumpy and he was pretty funny when he wanted to be… And dear lord _no_.

“You guys are the worst,” he whined into his hands, refusing to look into the smug faces of his friends.

“The word you are looking for is _best_ , Danny,” Tucker replied, “We are the _best_.”

“The best at being _awful_ ,” he correct when he finally lifted his head and gave Sam a baleful glare, “I hate you.”

“I know,” she cheerfully said as she patted his head. “And Danny,” she gave him a one armed hug and whispered, “I only asked if he was cute. You’re the one that freaked out.”

Danny groaned and Tucker began to playfully chant, “Danny likes Andrew! Danny likes Andrew!”

Tucker was only silenced by the pillow to hit his face and nearly knocked him out of the chair. “Hey!”

“It’s okay Danny,” Sam cooed, “Tucker just doesn’t understand what it’s like to have a big fat crush like you do.”

Tucker and Sam were the worst. The _worst_.


	9. A Construct

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hnnnnng i should be studying for stats and german but yaknow ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

> _"Obviously the idea of being human is a very human idea." - Dominic Monaghan_

Danny hadn’t had a good fight in quite a while. Most ghosts had either made peace with him and had stopped bothering the town or they stayed away from him out of fear. Because honestly, Danny could be a bit scary in ghost form now that he’d grown.

He didn’t look much different, he still wore the same black and white jumpsuit and he hadn’t grown in musculature _too_ much. He’d filled out and finally looked like he could hold his own in a fight but he still wasn’t very beefy, just toned. His hair had grown in both forms so the white hairband he used to tie it back in human form simply switched over to black when he went ghost. He also carried around more weapons, tiny things that were held in the utility belt around his waist. It made him feel like Batman and Tucker had even designed him ghost shaped versions of batarangs. Those were the best birthday present ever.

So Danny hadn’t changed much when it came to how he looked, he was still short and unassuming and not all that intimidating. No, what kept weaker ghosts away was what he could do with his powers.

He’d had three years to develop them after all.

He still wasn’t as powerful and adept with his powers as Vald, which made him scowl, but he could take down his usual enemies in seconds now. He was better at hand to hand combat from training with his mother and he had learned to manipulate both his ectoplasm and his ice core to better aid him in a fight. He was faster too, being able to break the sound barrier if he pushed himself to his limits. Ghosts didn't want to mess with him, overall, because of all that.

But then he also had the occasional ghost that just wanted to cause mischief. Namely Youngblood, who was doing just that.

“Come on, Youngblood,” Danny said placidly. He could physically take down the ghost at any moment, Youngblood wasn’t a very skilled fighter and was wide open for a hit, but that would mean injuring the kid and he didn’t want that. The child hadn’t caused any harm (yet), just creating a ruckus.

“Ha!” Youngblood shouted back, “You’ll never take me alive!”

Danny gave him an unimpressed look, “You’re right. Because you’re already dead.” The child ghost stuttered, “S-So?! You’ll still never catch me!” With that he stuck his tongue out at the other and flew off, cackling all the way.

Danny snorted before easily catching up to Youngblood. He held back a bit though, enjoying the sensation of flying. If the kid wanted a chase, then fine, he could have his chase. It wouldn’t hurt to have a little fun, he had nothing better to do at this point.

He just hoped his parents didn’t show up. Because while they were flying at breakneck speeds they were still within town limits, just going in loops and circles.

The child, still dressed as a small pirate, was laughing and having a grand time. He dodged Phantom at every twist and turn! He could outrun the mighty halfa forever! He was the best ghost pirate to ever exist!

Danny had to stop after dodging a stray ecto-beam, Youngblood flying ahead without notice. He looked down to find Jack and Maddie Fenton racing after them in the RV. Great, just what he was hoping _wouldn’t_ happen. He saw his mother firing up the bazooka again and decided that would be the end of playtime.

He raced toward the younger ghost, popping up in front of the other without breaking a sweat. “All right,” he said as he grabbed Youngblood and tucked him under his arm, “fun’s over.”

“Awww,” Youngblood wiggled in his grasp, “but Phantom! I was just about to get away.”

“No buts,” he hushed the other ghost, “we’ve got ghost hunter company.”

“Oh,” Youngblood fell still and silent, letting the teen carry him off. He know not to tangle with the real hunters. They could actually hurt him, they wouldn’t play with him the same way Phantom did. They would just shoot him down because he was “evil” and then he would be… Ended.

“Hey,” Danny looked down at the forlorn little kid, “you may be a thorn in my side sometimes, but I’d never let them get you. So don’t worry.”

Youngblood looked up at the teen contemplatively. Sure, they had a sort of unofficial truce going on, all the non-violent ghosts had one with Phantom nowadays, but was Phantom really saying he would _protect_ him? That was new. But then, Youngblood didn’t really have any doubt that the halfa would keep his word. While he had never _said_ anything like that, this wouldn’t be the first time he had fended off the Fentons from innocent ghosts. Over the years, Phantom had slowly become a protector of both the humans of the town _and_ the ghosts. Even if he hadn’t realized it yet.

“Okay.”

They flew on silently, Phantom easily putting distance between himself and the hunters. When they were out of range he turned invisible and headed back to Fentonworks to pop Youngblood back into the Zone through the portal.

“Thanks," Youngblood said meekly, a serious look on his face for once.

“No problem,” Danny said with a smile, ruffling the ghost’s hair before pushing him further into the Zone and following after.

He was due for another lesson with Clockwork after all so he might as well go now. It was a Saturday and both Sam and Tucker were busy with various other things, and seeing as Clockwork had told him that lessons didn’t follow a set schedule and were whenever he could show up (one of the perks of being Master of Time, he supposed, as CW was never surprised to see him) going to meet with his guardian was something he had planned to do anyway.

He waved to Youngblood before shooting off towards the Clocktower, his guardian’s lair.

* * *

 

They had discussed quite a few things about ghosts and how the Ghost Zone worked, small things like cores and powers and obsessions and a little more about lairs. Danny felt he knew a lot about the Zone and ghosts by this point but also knew that there was still a lot to learn. A lot that Clockwork wasn’t telling him yet. But there was one thing he wanted to know that Clockwork might tell him about.

“Hey, CW?” he ventured. They were in the usual Hall of Mirrors that depicted different possible events in Time, all of them involving things Danny couldn’t recognize.

“Yes, Daniel?” the Master of Time said, amused. That was a good sign in Danny’s book, if Clockwork was amused that meant he would probably tell him what he wanted to know.

“How does time, like, you know,” he made awkward motions with his hands, not knowing how to put his question into words, “…work, exactly?”

“It doesn’t,” the older ghost replied with a smirk.

Danny narrowed his eyes, positive that CW was messing with him, “What do you mean time doesn’t work? You’re the Master of it aren’t you?”

Clockwork’s grin grew wider, a knowing look in his eye. He loved teasing the boy, especially when he was still telling the truth. “I am,” he nodded sagely, “but time also has no Master.”

Danny gave him a baleful glare, the other was being purposefully obtuse.

Clockwork chuckled before giving his ward a break and actually explaining what he meant, “Time is a construct,” he started.

“It does not exist in a conventional manner outside of sentient thought,” he gestured to the both of them. “We perceive it as we do because our brains can’t handle anything else. Outside of ourselves and our own perceptions, Time,” he gestured to the mirrors around them, “ceases to be.”

“So…” Danny trailed off, not quite getting it, “time really _doesn’t_ work? Like, we made it up or something?”

“Precisely.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense!” he protested. “How can you manipulate it if it doesn’t exist? How does- How do we even function?! Time is a universal constant, isn’t it? It’s one of those things that can’t _not_ exist!”

“That is what I mean by construct, Daniel,” Clockwork explained patiently, “Time is not what we perceive it to be outside of our own thought. It isn’t _linear_ like most beings prefer to believe, and because our brains can’t process that, we perceive time in our own way. Or, you do at least.”

Danny squinted, trying to puzzle out what Clockwork was trying to say. He felt that understanding was just out of his grasp so he gave up with a sigh. Maybe he’d ask again some other day. There was another thing, though…

“So how do you mess with the time stream without creating a paradox or something? Do you just change it and hope for the best or…?”

Clockwork tapped at his chin, contemplating how to answer this one. He had talked about time with the Observants and other ghosts before that were curious, but he was hardly ever asked how he actually meddled with time.

“There are… several ways to change the outcomes of time. And many of them _do_ involve paradoxes,” he looked to a heavy locked cabinet, “like Dan.”

Danny blanched a bit at the mention of his evil older self, but nodded along nonetheless.

“But then others do _not_ ,” Clockwork frowned, “such as creating a divergence from the Alpha timeline. When I have to interfere with time, I prefer the alternative method in which a change in stream merely creates a different universe. It splits away from the Alpha and goes on its way from there. It’s less messy that way. ”

“Alpha?” Danny tilted his head to the side, “Like a main time stream? Does that make us the Alpha timeline?”

The older ghost huffed derisively, “We are not in the Alpha timeline, Daniel. Not even close.”

“Really?” the younger questioned, “Why not? What happened in the Alpha timeline then? What happened to it?”

“I didn’t like it,” Clockwork said, almost petulantly, “so I changed it.”

“Um,” Danny didn’t know what to say to that. The almighty Master of Time messed with timelines just because he didn’t like it? What- What could that mean? He had always thought Clockwork was this- impartial sort of ghost who just watched over time. But apparently not? “Aren’t there, I dunno, _rules_ or something about messing with the future too much.”

Clockwork shrugged, which did nothing to calm him down. “Not that I am aware of.”

“But- Seriously are you allowed to do that?!”

“Time does not exist in a _void_ , Daniel,” the other snarled, “ _I_ do not exist in a void. I am not unaffected by the things I observe. I do not remain unaffected by the people I see and know,” he shot Danny a look, “You would not be _here_ ,” he waved a hand around his lair, “if that were true.”

“Oh,” Danny drew a shaky breath and pulled a hand through his hair. He was still a little startled to see his mentor react like that. He supposed Clockwork had a point. Even if he was a ghost and even if he had these almighty powers, he still had feelings. It was still a bit scary to think that someone so _human_ , sort of, had control over something so important. Like finding out the person in charge of your Fate, or someone who had control over everything in your life, could change things on a whim _just because they wanted to_.

“Sorry.”

Clockwork sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, “It’s fine, Daniel. I should not have reacted so strongly.”

“It’s alright,” Danny patted his shoulder, “you have feelings too, CW. I should remember that more often.”

Clockwork gave the teen a genuine smile before it turned into a grin, “Speaking of feelings, Daniel…”

Danny did not like that tone of voice and knew he wouldn’t like what the other was about to say even less.

“Shouldn’t you be on your way to see young Andrew? I know you want to visit him more than little old me.”

Danny groaned while Clockwork laughed. Everyone was conspiring against him lately.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haaaaah a lot of this may seem like filler but its all important and we'll get back to the main plot again promise. there are THEMES to this fic i need to settle first


	10. A Visit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hahaaaaaaaaaaa i have a history final at 8am tomorrow

> _"It's nice to have a crush on someone. It feels like you're alive, you know?" - Scarlett Johansson_

Clockwork was irritated beyond belief by his unwanted guests. He always hated dealing with the Observants. They thought they knew what was best and what course the time stream should take and then thought that they could order _him_ around to do so. He was not a ghost to be ordered around by _anyone_.

“The older ghosts are growing restless, Clockwork,” one Observant told him with a dangerous look. They were _all_ growing restless.

“Then let them squirm,” he replied derisively. “What do I care for the comfort of the ancients? They will have to _wait_ , just like everybody else.”

“This is not something you can put on hold, Clockwork!” another Observant said indignantly, clearly angered by the Master of Time’s seemingly flippant attitude. All of the Observants were afraid of what might happen should they allow Clockwork to delay the inevitable, they would not let something potentially dangerous come to pass.

“It cannot be something that is _rushed_ either!” he snarled.

Couldn’t they _see_? It would be disastrous if they pushed Daniel too far and too soon. The right things had to happen first and in the right order. He had already mapped out the future in painstaking detail and he didn’t need _overbearing, hubris-filled, arrogant floating eyeballs to tell him how to do his job!_

Tension in room was rising as the group of Observants glared at the Master of Time, neither willing to back down.

“Time is _up_ , Clockwork!” one of the purple-cloaked crowd shouted.

“ _I_ SAY WHEN TIME IS UP!” Clockwork’s eyes were glowing red in anger and thick fangs protruded from his mouth, an ominous golden light pulsing from the staff in his hand at the same time. The deep gong of a grandfather clock resounded through the room and the Observants retreated from the furious ghost.

“ONLY _I_ KNOW WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT AND YOU _WILL NOT_ PUSH ME TO MAKE IT HAPPEN A MINUTE SOONER,” he glared at the cowering forms. Good. Maybe now they would actually _listen_ to him and leave him to do his job.

He narrowed his eyes and said quietly but not less sharply, “Do you understand?”

The Observants said nothing, simply glancing between themselves nervously. The fled without any acknowledgement of what Clockwork had said. But the important part was that they _had_ fled.

“Good,” Clockwork said smugly when he was the only one left in the room again, his eyes returned to their normal red and his teeth back to their original form. It was rare for him to ever be that angry, but the Observants had a knack for truly pissing him off.

He turned back to the Hall of Mirrors with a huff. “I know what I’m doing,” he muttered.

“Probably.” 

* * *

 

 

After the conversation he had with Clockwork yesterday, and some merciless teasing from Sam and Tucker, Danny decided that it _would_ be nice to go visit Andrew again. He was a fun guy to hang out with okay! It was _not_ because of some silly little crush that he didn’t even have. Of course not.

Vidya greeted him with her usual cheerful trill as Danny pushed open the grand oak doors of the entrance of Andrew’s lair.

“Hey, Viddy!” he greeted back. The ghostly library could always put him in a good mood for some reason. It was just yet another thing that brought him back all the time.

“And why did you just call my lair, _Viddy_?” Andrew said with a yawn as he entered the foyer where Danny stood, a coffee cup in his hand and stack of papers under his arm.

Danny shrugged, “You look tired,” he observed. And the other really did, he looked exhausted with bags under his bright green eyes, his shoulders slumped over, and a look that promised the End to all who dared annoy him.

“I _am_ tired,” Andrew grumbled as he took a sip of ecto-coffee and grimacing before grabbing the papers under his arm and waving them a little, “three a.m. inspiration will do that.”

“Oh,” Danny rubbed the back of his neck, “should I come back later? So you can sleep?”

Andrew shook his head, “No. It’s fine, Danny. Come on in,” he gestured to the door he had just exited from before slipping back in.

Danny was slightly flustered by the other calling him by his actual name for the first time. It was just new and weird, that’s was all. Yeah, totally.

He followed Andrew into the room and shouldn’t have been as surprised as he was to see a kitchen. It was of decent size and looked like the average kitchen you would find in an office building rather than a home. Which, now that he thought about it, would make some sense as they _were_ still in a library and Andrew was a ghost so he wouldn’t have much need for a fully functional one. The coffee pot was working, though, he noticed. The pot was nearly empty and Danny supposed Andrew had already consumed most of it.

There were two tables in the space and Andrew placed his papers on the smaller of the two before trudging over to the microwave and placing his mug inside to reheat his coffee. The table he had left his papers on was covered in balled up paper, pots of old fashioned ink, and what looked like a hundred snapped feathers, presumably the quills he used to write with. There were two chairs at the smaller table and Danny plopped down into one, looking over the mess with curiosity.

Andrew leaned back into the counter as the microwave whirred and Danny questioned him, “So what kept you up so late?”

The Ghostwriter shrugged before turning to retrieve his coffee as the timer on the microwave went off and then answering, “I just had a breakthrough on how to write a certain scene in one of my projects and then,” he paused to sip at the now steaming liquid in his cup, his glasses fogging up slightly “I just kept going from there. It happens.”

“What’s your project about?” Danny asked, ever curious.

“Oh, this and that,” Andrew waved a dismissive hand. “Maybe I’ll tell you when I’m finished,” he narrowed his eyes before softly grumbling, “If I _ever_ finish.”

“Oh,” Danny slumped in his chair, faintly disappointed, “um, okay.”

Andrew raised an eyebrow at the other, “Now, was there a purpose to this visit? Or was it just to bask in my _delightful_ company?”

“No reason,” Danny scratched at his cheek before grinning, “And if came to bask in anyone’s company it would be Vidya’s. She’s way more _delightful_ than you.”

Airy, legato quarter notes indicated Vidya’s gently amused agreement.

“My own lair,” Andrew laughed into his mug, “Turned against me.”

They sat in a comfortable moment of silence after that, Andrew sipping at his ecto-coffee and Danny swinging his legs back and forth under his chair. Light spilled in from the single window in the kitchen, bathing the room in a soft glow and lending it a serene atmosphere.

Andrew lazily watched Danny glance around his kitchen, he was always so curious. It was amusing to watch his expressions sometimes, and his face was like an open book. It was so easy to know what the other teen was thinking and his generally cheerful if somewhat clumsy disposition made it a joy to have him around. There was just something about his smile… Andrew’s breath caught slightly as the sunlight bounced off of Danny’s bright white hair, giving him a dazzling halo and even caught the acid green of his eyes, making him seem ethereal and even more otherworldly.

Then Danny moved his head again and the moment was lost, but not forgotten. Andrew fell back into the comfortable silence and took another sip of ecto-coffee, enjoying the warmth and letting the moment settle in his mind. Now was not the time or place to mention it.

Andrew had closed his eyes at some point but opened them to see Danny looking at the scraps of balled up paper on the table and about to unfold one of them. Andrew made a strange noise in the back of his throat and almost spilled his coffee all over himself in his haste to put it down and stop the other from fully opening the paper.

“Don’t-” but it was too late.

Danny was already staring at the straightened out sheet with wide eyes and a blush, “Um.”

Andrew refused to look him in the eye. Danny didn’t really know how to react to be honest. On the paper were several doodles of a person and some unintelligible notes. While the drawings weren’t sketch-artist quality, they were still recognizable as doodles of Danny himself. There was a tight little ball in his chest and he couldn’t describe what he was feeling. Flattered? Probably. Embarrassed? Definitely. Most of the drawings were of him smiling.

“So I guess you like my face, huh?” Danny instantly regretted the words as soon as they came out of his mouth but they were already out there and it was too late. He slapped a hand over his mouth to prevent himself from saying anything else as the blush on his face turned a deeper red.

Andrew still wasn’t looking at him when he said in a small voice, “Yes.”

Danny choked a bit on air, his hands covering his entire face at this point to hide his blush. Suddenly he dropped his hands and stumbled as he tried to stand.

“Um, so I’m just- I’m just gonna- ,” he had no idea what he was doing, all he knew was that escaping this situation as soon as possible would be the best option.

“Wait,” Andrew managed mutter, “I’m sorry if- Ah, what I mean to say is- You see,” he took a deep breath and ran a hand through his hair before rushing the sentence, “I hope I don’t come off as… creepy?”

“Um” Danny nearly squeaked, “no! I-,” he rubbed the back of his neck without looking in Andrew’s direction. “I thought it was kinda cute.”

There was a beat of silence before Danny shouted, “WELL,” as he rushed towards the door of the kitchen, “I THINK I’M GONNA GO NOW- BYE.”

The trill of Vidya’s laugh was the only reply and he could hear the doors of his lair close behind the teen as he left. Andrew hid his blushing face in his hands, pushing his glasses out of the way.

He needed some sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me too andy, me too  
> and before you ask yes, Clockwork was watching the whole scene between Danny and Andrew and he was laughing the entire time


	11. A Prank

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finals are over!!! now i can make u guys some chapters like this behemoth >:3c (this is just in time for my roomies 20th bday! whooo!)

> _“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” - William Shakespeare, Hamlet_

Vladimir Masters was standing in front of his window and contemplating his current situation deeply. His face was illuminated from the stark glow of the moon outside, casting half of him in light and half of him in shadow. It accentuated the ominous red glow that seemed to seep from his navy blue irises and the deep frown that cut across his face. His eyes had deep bags sitting under them and his usually immaculate hair was slightly disheveled. His shoulders were tense, his back ramrod straight, and the hands clasped behind him were clenched tightly. Vlad was not a happy man.

He was so close to having everything he wanted, but for some reason he wasn’t as satisfied or, even excited for that matter, as he thought he would be. He frowned harder as he watched the light rain patter against the window. Something was missing. Something was off. It almost felt like he was forgetting something and the memory of it was just within his grasp before it would slip away, slip back in the depths of his mind until it resurfaced again but still out of reach. It was frustrating beyond belief and it felt far too important to simply ignore. If he could just manage to figure out what it was…

A soft alarm trilled from the phone in his pocket and a smug smirk stretched across his face. It wasn’t the time to dwell on forgotten memories, his latest project would soon be complete.

He had fused Madeline Fenton’s own DNA with the latest model android available and created the nearly perfect carbon copy. All he would need to do next is give it a few more tweaks, perform the old switcheroo, maybe wipe a few memories, and then the _real_ Maddie would be his for the taking and her family none the wiser.

His plan would go perfectly. Or so he though until he heard a small explosion come from the direction of his lab and he felt his mansion give the slightest of shudders.

His eyes widened in distress as he rushed out of the room.

_Oh, butter biscuits!_  

* * *

 

“One of the most interesting things about _Hamlet_ , in my humble opinion, is Hamlet’s indecision when it comes to killing his Uncle for his Father’s vengeance. He has seen the ghost of his father directly and yet he can’t be sure…”

Danny stopped paying attention to Lancer’s rant about the latest Shakespeare play they were supposed to be reading and analyzing. Honestly, he could care less at the moment and was trying his hardest to just not fall asleep, lest he get in trouble for napping during the lecture. He could Sparknote it when he got home. Seriously, No Fear Shakespeare was created for a reason and Danny was going to take full advantage of it. He was making decent enough grades in the class that it didn’t really matter, anyway.

Tucker, who had the English III class with him wasn’t faring any better. Danny could already see drool hanging from his friend’s mouth. Disgusting, but funny none the less. Like any best friend would do, Danny decided to mess with him for his own amusement. It was better than listening to Lancer at least.

Tucker’s head was resting on his propped up hand and Danny couldn’t ask for a better set up. The debris on the desk and Tucker’s glasses were a bit of an obstacle though.

Danny glanced around to make sure no one was looking, and after seeing that he was the only one in class still awake and Lancer wasn’t paying attention to anything, he slowly reached over and turned Tucker’s glasses intangible and easily slipped them off the other teen’s face. Danny placed them on his own desk for safe keeping and grinned. Phase one: complete.

Phase two was even easier. Danny didn’t even need to use his powers to quickly snatch all the things off of Tucker’s desk; a pencil and a few blank sheets of paper. Danny didn’t know why Tucker even bothered to pull out the supplies when they both knew he fell asleep the instant Lancer started to speak.

Now came the fun part. Slowly, ever so slowly, Danny nudged the arm that held up Tucker’s head until it was nearly off the desk. Then he grinned and leaned over to whisper in his ear.

“Tucker,” he kept his voice low enough that Lancer couldn’t hear them from the back of the classroom but loud enough to hopefully rouse his friend.

“Pst, Tuck.”

He got a snort and a mumbled “Mm?” for his troubles. Good, that meant Tucker was _just_ awake enough to hear what he said next.

“The Lunch Lady took all the meat for lunch today, so all we have is salad.”

With a quiet gasp and a mumbled, “No!” Tucker jerked awake, only to find his elbow slipping off his desk and his head plummeting forwards onto Danny’s waiting hand seconds later.

Danny watched with glee at his friend’s rude awakening. Though he _did_ catch Tucker’s head before it could slam into the desk. He was pranking his friend not trying to kill him, and he knew from experience how much it hurt to have a face to desk rendezvous.

Danny pushed Tucker’s head back up with a grin still on his face and handed the confused man his glasses.

“What,” was all he could manage after being forced to wake so suddenly, still being groggy from the short nap.

Danny snickered, “Morning, sunshine.”

“…what?” Tucker narrowed his eyes as his brain caught up with everything and then they widened in realization. “Dude!” he shouted as Danny had to hold a hand over his mouth so he wouldn’t burst into laughter.

“Is there a _problem_ , Mr. Foley?” came Lancer’s frosty voice from the front of the room.

Some of the students stirred but no one really moved to look back at the duo that had caught Lancer’s attention.

“No, sir!” was Tucker’s instant reply, that only made it harder for Danny to hold in his cackling.

“Mr. Fenton?” Lancer switched his glare to the other teen causing a ruckus in his classroom.

Danny couldn’t speak he was trying so hard not to laugh so he merely shook his head.

Lancer sighed before lifting his gaze from them and resuming his lecture on _Hamlet_. He sorely needed a vacation from adolescent teens but he loved his job too much for that. If only the students would actually _behave_ and _pay attention._

“I’m gonna get you for this, dude,” Tucker whispered to Danny, who was still shaking from held in laughter.

Danny could only manage a sarcastic thumbs-up motion and he was ignored for the rest of the class. He didn’t mind it so much, though. It had been totally worth it.

* * *

 

 “… and then he told me the Lunch Lady took all the meat away!” Tucker was in the middle of ranting to Sam about what Danny had done earlier that day as the three of them sat down for lunch. Tucker had a stack of unidentifiable meat products, Sam had what looked like just grass, and Danny had what he felt was the only normal lunch of a pb&j. He was also trying not to laugh again as Tucker recounted his brilliant plan.

“Tragic,” was Sam’s dry response.

“Oh, come on,” Tucker whined, “I know you don’t like meat and all but what Danny said was cruel!” The teen began waving his hands around as they all set down theirs trays at their usual lunch table. “That’s one of my worst nightmare’s you know!”

Danny and Sam shared a look before turning to Tucker with blank faces and muttering at the same time, “Tragic.”

Tucker pouted before crossing his arms. “You’re both conspiring against me.”

Danny shrugged and Sam said slyly, “Maybe. But you’ll never find out if we are.”

“So, speaking of worst nightmares,” Sam’s gaze slid towards Danny, who was sitting across from her, “have you spoken to Andrew lately, Danny?”

Tucker mumbled a, “What does that even have to do with-,” before Sam slapped a hand over his mouth to shut him up.

Her purple lips pulled up into a Cheshire grin when she saw Danny visibly gulp.

He did not like that smile, not at all. He liked it even less when all he could squeak out was a confused, “Yes?”

She placed her elbows on the table and rested her chin on one of her hands before imperiously waving him on, “And?”

“And?” Danny repeated before mumbling in a rush, “And nothing happened please leave me alone about it please.”

“No dice,” she said with a grin before taking a sip of water, “Something _must_ have happened. You’ve been in a daze since Tuesday.”

“I have not!” he protested. At least he didn’t think so.

“Yeah, you have,” Tucker confirmed with a nod and then tore into the meat stack on his plate.

Sam gave it a disgusted look before her grin slipped back and she turned to Danny, “So, spill.”

Danny sighed and put his head in his hands before reluctantly telling them of his latest and most embarrassing encounter with Andrew to date.

By the end of the tale both Sam and Tucker were just staring at him and he didn’t really know how to take it. Did he fuck up? Was something wrong? Why weren’t they saying anything?

“This is bad,” Sam said solemnly, finally breaking the silence.

“What do you mean this is bad?!” Danny panicked.

“It’s bad because this means you’re _both_ oblivious,” she sternly pointed her fork in his direction, “and in denial.”

“It’s hopeless, Sam,” Tucker said as he shook his head, “Hopeless.”

“What am I even in denial about?!” Danny was still lost in the conversation.

“Andrew totally likes you,” Tucker said bluntly, deciding to spare his friend from the agony.

Danny sputtered, not really knowing what to say before scoffing, “He does not.”

Sam glared at him and Tucker muttered under his breath, “See? Totally hopeless.”

“Okay, fine,” Danny crossed his arms over his chest, “say he _does_ like me, what am I supposed to do about it?”

Sam looked at him incredulously and then began tapping a finger on her chin with a contemplative expression before she turned to Danny and shrugged, “Your best bet is to probably just tell him you like him.”

“Um, no,” was Danny’s immediate response. Who was Sam kidding? How could he ever tell Andrew about the silly little crush he has? Not only would it be the most embarrassing experience of his life but it would also probably ruin his friendship with the other ghost. He really didn’t want that.

“Um, _yes_ ,” Sam shot back, “because apparently he is just as oblivious as you are and I want you to be happy.”

The last part of that took him aback, “What?” he asked Sam with wide eyes, not sure he heard right.

Sam’s eyes softened, “I want you to be happy, Danny, and I think Andrew could really do that for you.”

Tucker nodded beside her, “Yeah, man. You gush about him all the time and he obviously likes you back, so I say go for it.”

Danny blushed and sunk down onto the bench he was sitting on, “I do not _gush_ about him.”

“You do,” Sam said with a smile, “and it’s adorable.”

Tucker laughed before sobering, “But seriously dude, we wouldn’t tell you to go for it if we thought it would backfire. Have a little faith in us.”

Sam nodded, “Just tell him and it’ll all work out. Promise.”

Danny shifted in his seat and looked down at his uneaten sandwich, they had been so busy talking that he hadn’t noticed that he hadn’t eaten. Oh well, as a half ghost he didn’t need all that much food anyway. But that wasn’t what he should be focusing on… he bit his lip.

Could Sam and Tucker be right? Could Andrew really like him back? It seemed impossible really. He was a ghost, he was older, he _hated_ him the first time they met, he probably only tolerated Danny’s presence in his lair all the time, and Danny had made a fool of himself that one time he had sobbed all over the other ghost. The list could go on for ages.

“Danny,” Sam interrupted his discouraging thoughts, “worst comes to worst is that he doesn’t like you back. It’s not the end of the world and you can still be friends. That is the _worst_ that can happen.”

The friend part made him feel a bit better, but it still wasn’t exactly encouraging.

“But the _best_ thing that could happen, Danny,” Tucker leaned forward and put his hands on the table, “is that he likes you back and you two fall _madly in love_ and stay together _forever_.”

Sam punched Tucker in the arm for the comment and Danny was speechless, his gut twisting at the thought. Forever was a really long time and he may have a crush on Andrew but, really?

“You scare him off and I kill you, Tuck,” Sam threatened as she punched him in the arm again, just for good measure. Then she turned to Danny, “But he’s right.”

“What?!” Danny and Tucker screeched at the same time.

“Not about the forever thing!” Sam corrected angrily, “About the liking you back thing. It’s the best outcome _and_ the most likely.”

“I-,” Danny rubbed at the back of his neck nervously and quietly said, “Okay.”

“Okay?!” Sam slapped her hands on the table and looked at him with excitement, “You’ll tell him?!”

Danny nodded and mumbled, “I’ll try.”

Tucker whooped and he and Sam high-fived, much to Danny’s misery.

This was going to end in disaster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> do not worry danny, for i too, am oblivious to everything and im so sorry tuck that prank scene did not have to be there but... i just wrote it and- 
> 
> anyway i lov u all <3 and pleeeeease feel free to ask me questions or whatever. bc i could gush about the ins and outs of this fic for hours and half of what i have may not ever make it into the fic :(


	12. A Confession

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha yeaaaah so imma start posting chapters every monday and thursday instead of immediately after i write them so i can stock up on chapters to post when i go back to school. that way i dont leave you guys hangin when my workload picks up
> 
> anyway this chapter was kinda hard to write so im not too happy with but have it anyway!

> _"If I could just throw all my doubts into the wind, I think that they'd come back again. But I know that every cloud has a silver lining." - No Wonder I by LAKE_

 

Clockwork slammed the book shut in fury and disappointment. He knew it was going to happen, he had seen it, even if it was just a brief possibility, but he needed confirmation. And now he had it, but it didn’t make him feel any better.

He shoved the book into a small and empty vault. The translation of it was only half-way complete but there was no need for Daniel to stumble upon it before then. He would know what it would have to say soon enough.

Clockwork glanced at the title one last time, _Ich bin halb von ein tot Mann_ , before slamming the door to the vault shut and concealing it.

His fist shook at the thought of what was going to happen, both the destruction he would cause and the naturally inevitable. Just because he knew it _could_ happen, didn’t mean he hadn’t had contingency plans to stop it. But now he knew. It would happen despite all of his powers, despite all of his plans, not matter what _anyone_ would try to do about it.

Clockwork heaved a great and weary sigh before leaving the room and drifting in the hallways of his lair. The Tower released a concerned chime which he waved off. He would be fine. Daniel and Vladimir however…

Why did it have to be _them_? 

* * *

 

Danny was procrastinating. Danny was procrastinating more than he ever had in his life. Why? Because he was scared and nervous and he made a promise to his friends so he _was_ going to keep it but… he just had to work up the courage to do it first.

He floated before the ghost portal in Phantom form, flying back and forth in ghostly version of pacing. He had been putting this off and that seemed to only make it worse.

“It’s been a week, Danny,” Sam said sternly from below. He wouldn’t look at her.

“I know,” he mumbled. He really did.

“Just _go_ , dude,” Tucker said, not looking up from his PDA. He was probably texting his girlfriend.

“But what if-,” Danny started nervously.

“Danny,” Sam said warningly, he didn’t have to be looking at her to feel the glare, “ _go_.”

“Okay, okay, fine,” Danny held his hands up in surrender, “I’ll go.”

He flew towards the portal and closed his eyes as his stomach flipped and flopped. This was not going to be fun.

Sam watched him fly off and just before he passed through the swirling vortex she shouted, “And don’t you _dare_ chicken out on me!”

Tucker finally looked up from his PDA to watch his friend leave, “Think he’ll actually do it?”

Sam shrugged, “Maybe,” then she grinned, “Probably not on purpose though. Now that we’ve put the thought in his head he’ll probably end up stuttering it out on accident.”

Tucker laughed, “True, that does sound like him.”

Sam and Tucker ascended the stairs of the basement, not worried about Danny’s parents finding them as they had left an hour ago to go grocery shopping and wouldn’t be home for a few more. They always took forever to buy food.

“Five bucks says he comes back and won’t tell us what happened,” Tucker joked as they made their way to Danny’s bedroom to hang out and wait for his return.

Sam grinned, “ _Ten_ bucks says he comes back and blurts out something about Andrew first thing.”

“Ohhh,” Tucker said as he narrowed his eyes, “that’s a hard one, but I’ll take that bet.”

“Then we have a deal,” Sam smiled as she flopped back onto Danny’s mattress. Tucker made himself at home at Danny’s desk.

All they had to do now, was wait. 

* * *

 

Danny was nervous as hell but he was _going to do this, dammit._ He was going to tell Andrew! He was going to actually say it! He was- oh man was he actually going to do this? Oh boy, this was going to be worse than the time his pants fell down in front of Paulina because of his powers. This was awful and it was going to suck, but he was going to do this! He was! He promised Sam and Tucker after all and maybe… maybe it wouldn’t be that bad? Maybe Andrew… possibly, actually did like him back?

Shit, he was way too nervous for this to end well.

Danny nearly turned tail when he landed in front of the doors to Andrew’s lair. Unfortunately for him, Vidya trilled a happy greeting and opened the doors the moment he set foot on the stone steps.

“Ah, thanks Vidya,” he said weakly. Maybe he could still leave? Like, right now?

“Danny?” Andrew called out as he entered the foyer from the main room. Ha, too late.

“Um, hi?” Danny was already rubbing at the back of his neck and fidgeting where he stood. Andrew gave him an odd look for his behavior as he shuffled the papers he was holding and looked away.

“You…,” he started cautiously, “haven’t visited me in a while.” There was a hint of disappointment in his tone that Danny barely caught.

Danny frowned, it was true. He had begun to visit Andrew more often than this and then he went over a week without a word. And right after that fiasco too…

“Yeah,” Danny said softly, “sorry about that. I was… um, busy.”

Andrew nodded slowly before gesturing back to the main room, “Would you like to come sit down?”

“Sure!” Danny blurted a little too enthusiastically, an embarrassed blush spreading across his cheeks a moment after. He ducked his head as Andrew blinked at the overzealous response.

“Alright,” Andrew said with a growing smile, “come on then.”

Danny grumbled as he followed Andrew into the main room, his head still tilted down to hide his blush. This was already going _so well_. Maybe he could tell Andrew another day. Yeah, that sounded nice.

But then he remembered that Sam and Tucker would be waiting for him when he got back and Sam would everything in her power to make him regret not confessing. He paled at the thought, Sam could be scarier than any enemy he had previously fought when she wanted to be and he did _not_ want to incur her wrath when he could avoid it. Girls were fucking scary.

Surprisingly Andrew led them to the pillow circle in the middle of the room and plopped down without ceremony, placing the papers that had been in his hand down on a table and then patting the spot next to him. It was mostly surprising to Danny because he’d never seen Andrew so, well _relaxed_. Half the time Danny was over Andrew was multitasking; working on something or shelving books or cleaning while they talked. Danny gulped, this was going to be even harder then with Andrew’s full attention.

Danny flopped down onto the pillows and immediately began fidgeting. The silence stretched on, neither knowing what to say.

Andrew coughed before saying, “So… Was there anything specific you wanted to discuss?”

“Yes!” Danny immediately chirped. “But um,” he murmured, “I don’t really know… uh, how?”

“Oh?” Andrew tilted his head and shifted in the pillows so he was facing the other ghost directly.

Danny looked away and couldn’t formulate anything to say so he took a deep breath and just blurted something out.

“Sam and Tucker kind of made me come today and I don’t know how to say what I need too and I just-,” he cut himself off there. What a fantastic way to start, Danny, absolutely wonderful.

“Ah,” was Andrew’s disappointed reply. “I… see.”

“N-no, no!” Danny waved his hands around frantically, trying to backtrack, “I didn’t mean it like that! I like visiting you, I promise. I really, really do! I’m just nervous and I don’t- I don’t know how to…” he trailed off and buried his head in his hands. How could he ever think he could do this?! This was embarrassing and the worst.

“Danny?” Andrew questioned, worried when the other stopped talking so abruptly and then fell into silence. Usually Danny wouldn’t _stop_ talking when he was around, so this was new and slightly concerning. Especially after the last visit. Andrew frowned, he _knew_ he had scared the other off with his silly drawings.

Danny took a deep breath and steeled himself for what he was about to say. It was either do or die at this point because if he went back without saying anything Sam would most definitely kill him all the way.

“So,” he started shortly before rushing his next words in a long exhale, “I kinda like you, like I have this huge crush on you like you, and Sam and Tucker are convinced that you like me back but I don’t think so and they made me come here to tell you that and I don’t know what to do about it because every relationship I’ve had before this has ended in disaster and- and yeah.”

The library was silent, Danny couldn’t even look at Andrew when he finished, and Andrew was staring at the other with wide eyes.

“You,” Andrew said carefully, softly, “… like me?”

“Yes,” Danny mumbled from behind his hand, still refusing to look at him.

“I,” Andrew gave a soft laugh of disbelief, “I, ah, like you too.”

Danny’s head snapped up and he stared at the other with wide eyes, “You do?!”

Andrew nodded slowly, slightly nervous.

Danny grinned and jumped closer to the other, nearly tackling him into the pillows, “That- that’s great!”

Andrew was startled by Danny’s sudden change in attitude but was charmed by the large grin across his face nonetheless, especially when it was so close to his own. A smile quirked at his own lips at the sight of Danny’s unrestrained excitement, “I suppose.”

“Dude!” Danny’s normally cocky attitude was back in place as he continued to grin down at the other, “You like me!”

He was so happy! Andrew _liked_ him! Andrew actually like him back! Something in his life was actually working out! Oh man, he totally owed Sam and Tucker something nice. The embarrassment that had been plaguing him slipped away, replaced by a sudden bubbly giddiness.

“Yes,” Andrew drawled, “I _did_ already say that.”

“Sooo,” Danny’s gaze flicked around the library before resettling on Andrew, not quite knowing where to take this, “What do we do about it?”

The Ghostwriter shrugged, “What would you like?”

Danny tilted his head to the side in thought, a blush painting his cheeks, “We could try dating?”

“Alright,” Andrew said agreeably, too distracted by the warm, fuzzy feeling in his chest.

“So, we’re boyfriends?”

“Yes?”

“Great!” Danny chirped as he flung himself back into the pillows beside Andrew, huge smile still in place. “Now that that’s established, you should tell me more about yourself so I actually know who I’m dating.”

Andrew laughed at Danny’s curiosity and sudden subject change. This was more like it. Constant questions and witty quips. That was the Danny he had come to like.

“Well,” Andrew paused, not quite sure where to start, “I was born in France, I died at twenty two, and I was studying to become a teacher before I did.”

“So, was French your first language?” Danny rolled to face the other ghost better from where he was lounging in the pillows.

“Oui, mon petit chou,” Andrew grinned when the teen blushed at the reply.

“What... does that mean?” Danny questioned.

Andrew only grinned, a blush spreading across his own cheeks, “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“Pff- fine then mister french fry,” Danny scoffed before changing the subject,  “So, you’re twenty two, huh?”

“Yes,” Andrew said simply, secretly wary as to how the other will react.

“That makes you like, five years older than me. You’re _ancient_ ,” Danny made a face.

Andrew’s shoulders slumped and he gave a half-shrug without looking at the other.

Danny sighed, “I was joking, Andy. Just because you’re literally a dinosaur doesn’t mean I’m gonna stop liking you.”

Andrew threw a pillow at Danny, “If I’m a dinosaur then you are an infant.”

“Hey!” Danny threw the pillow back at Andrew.

"I'm going to trap you in another poem, this time about respecting your elders!" Andrew proclaimed as he gathered as many pillows as he could and launched them all at the halfa.

"So you admit you're old!" Danny shouted back with a laugh as he began his own hunt for ammunition.

Vidya’s trilling laugh could be heard as the two men began a fierce pillow fights interspersed with laughing fits, Andrew cursing in French, and Danny’s taunting banter.

Yeah, Danny seriously owed Sam and Tucker the nicest things he could afford, because this was fantastic and he wouldn’t trade this moment for the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ye so i nearly forgot about that book like??? wow ace you almost forgot a pretty important plot point??? oops // oh hey i changed my tumblr url to nabtime u can blame promsien
> 
> anyway heres a preview for the next chapter: Tucker is going to owe Sam 10 bucks


	13. A Discovery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *sailor scout salute* hey

 

> _"Il n'y a pas de fumée sans feu_." - _French Proverb_

“He’s French,” were the first words out of Danny’s mouth when he arrived back in his room after his visit with Andrew. He immediately regretted them and hid his blushing face behind his hands while Sam gave an excited whoop and gestured to Tucker for her money. Tucker grumbled while he pulled out his wallet and handed over the ten dollar bill.

“I hate you both,” Danny mumbled from behind his hands as he trudged over to his bed. He pulled the comforter out from under Sam, making her yelp and tumble off the bed, before wrapping it around himself and hiding from the world.

Tucker, done complaining about losing the bet, turned to Danny with a grin, “Does that mean it went well?”

Danny, softly from his spot under his blanket, whispered, “Yes.”

“So, are you guys _dating_ now?” Sam, having popped back up from where she fell, was also grinning at this point.

“Yes,” Danny whispered again.

“Told you!” Sam shouted as she leaned over to give Tucker a high-five.

“That’s right, son, you should always listen to your parents,” Tucker added with a stern nod.

Danny groaned and pulled the blanket over his head as he curled up on his bed. Why did his friends have to be like this? Why did they have to torture him like this? What did he do to deserve this?

“So, Andrew’s French?” Sam asked, coming back to what Danny had first said.

“Yeah,” Danny grumbled before something occurred to him, “Hey, Sam, you’re taking French, right?”

“Yeah, why?” Sam raised her eyebrow and perched her arms on the edge of the bed.

Danny popped he head out from the blanket, “What does mon petit chou, mean?”

“Mon petit…” Sam mumbled before she suddenly started laughing, “Oh my gosh, did he call you that?! That's so fucking cute!”

“Yes?” Danny replied, a little worried about Sam laughing, “What does it mean?!”

“It’s… a term of endearment but,” Sam was still chuckling as she moved to rummage through her backpack, “here,” she held out a French to English dictionary, “look it up for yourself.”

Warily Danny grabbed the book and started flipping through the pages, looking for mon and then petit. He vaguely knew what they meant but decided to double check. My and little, okay, embarrassing but not so bad so far. So what made Sam start laughing?

Then he got to chou.

“He called me a cabbage?! What the fuck?!”

Sam, who had calmed her laughter down to giggles, exploded again at the exclamation and now Tucker was even chuckling along.

“Sam, stop laughing!” Danny whined.

But Sam couldn’t stop, she was already wheezing on the floor. Oh man! She hoped Andrew stuck around because obviously the guy was hilarious. And Danny’s reaction! Priceless. Her only regret was not catching it on camera.

“Hi, sweetie,” Danny’s mother stood in the doorway to his room with a smile on her face, “what seems to be so funny, Sam?”

Tucker smirked, “Danny’s got himself a new boyfriend with a sense of humor.”

“Oh?” there was a sparkle in his mother’s eye as she entered the room, smile widening, “Sweetie, that’s great!”

“Moooom!” Danny pulled his comforter over his head again, wanting to hide from the world.

While Danny still hadn’t told his parents about his ghost half, he doubted it would be any time soon either, he had come out to them about being bisexual nearly a year ago. Jazz had been home from Harvard at the time and had supported him all the way, but it turned out he didn’t really need it as his parents took it in stride.

_His mother had held his hands and said, “Thank you for telling us, sweetheart, we really appreciate you being open with us.”_

_His Dad had been just as accepting as he smiled and said, “Well, Danny my boy, just so long as you’re happy.”_

What honestly threw Danny for a loop was when they had gone on to mention Vlad.

_“You remember our old college buddy, right?” Jack had asked. “Well, he’s bisexual too and we never thought any less of him.”_

_His mom laughed behind her hand, “Oh yes, he even had the cutest little crushes on both of us, didn’t he, Jack?”_

_“Oh yeah!” Jack shouted, “He was just a little freshman back then! Followed us around and everything! Well, until we actually became friends that is. Then we actually talked!”_

That conversation had been a little surreal considering what he knew about Vlad.

“So,” his mother plopped down onto the bed beside him, “who is it?”

Danny made a face at Sam and Tucker who were just silently laughing at him before answering his mom with a small, reluctant voice, “His name is Andrew.”

“Andrew who?” Maddie immediately asked, “Does he go to your school? Where did you meet him? Is he cute?”

“Mom!” Danny cried, “It’s a… long distance relationship. You wouldn’t know him.”

It was technically true and his mother _really_ didn’t need to know he was actually dating a ghost. That would very much end in disaster for everyone involved.

“Oh,” Maddie deflated, she was really hoping to physically meet the boy. It was part of every parent’s dream to mortify their children by showing their romantic interests embarrassing baby photos, after all. Perhaps if this Andrew stuck around long enough… Another time then.

“Alright then, dear,” she sighed and patted his knee, “but I expect updates!” She pointed a finger at him sternly before getting up and heading towards the door. “Sam, Tucker, I need to know right away if he breaks my baby’s heart, you hear?”

Sam gave Maddie a salute while Tucker nodded seriously, Maddie grinned and Danny buried his head back under his blankets.

“Oh and Danny?” Maddie called back from the doorway.

Danny gave a weak moan of despair in answer.

“Don’t forget your sister’s coming back for Winter Break next week so you’ll need to go pick her up from the airport.”

“Okay.”

“Bye, sweetie!”

And with that Maddie shut the door to Danny’s room and Sam and Tucker started laughing again.

“Fuck off,” he grumbled to them which only made them laugh harder.

Danny then resorted to his usual line of defense; throwing his pillows at them.

* * *

 

_Thunder rumbled through Danny’s dream and lightning flashed across the black expanse he found himself floating in. This wasn’t a nightmare, not really, it didn’t feel like one at all. Even with the strange, uncomfortable sensation on the small of his back, like something was not quite touching it and making it arch but there was nothing there. It made him uneasy, but otherwise everything was calm._

_Danny drifted this way and that but never found anything besides the continuing darkness. Only the occasional flash of lightning, blinding in brightness, broke up the monotony of the dark and the gentle roll of thunder would reverberate with it._

_His dream went on like this for what seemed like hours. It was relaxing in a sense, just the calm black abyss surrounding him as he slowly floated about, being lulled by the rumbling in the distance._

_Then he could hear the train._

_That eerie, unearthly wail of a whistle pierced through the shroud of darkness with a shrill, sharp call. He could hear the ominous clacks of the moving train following after. The thunder had stopped and the lightning no longer illuminated the bleak landscape, there was only the thick black atmosphere and the haunting sounds of the train._

_But Danny wasn’t afraid. No matter how frightening the train may seem to be he knew its arrival would hold another message. He could remember the train now, the one he had dreamed of not long ago, he could remember a voice desperately trying to convey a message, but he couldn’t remember what it was._

_He hoped he wouldn’t forget this one in the morning, because these messages, whatever they may be, were probably very important._

_“It’s coming,” a soft voice whispered. “It’s coming.”_

_Danny called out to it, “What’s coming?”_

_“You must stop it. You must. You must,” the whisper grew more fervent, more desperate._

_The whistle sounded again, a long and deep moaning lament. The clacking of the train grew louder and faster._

_“What do I have to stop?” Danny cried out over the sounds of the train, hoping to find some answers._

_“IT’S COMING!” the voice was shrieking now, louder than the train, “YOU MUST STOP IT!”_

_“WHAT IS IT?” Danny shouted back, getting frustrated by this cryptic message. How was he supposed to stop something if he didn’t know what it was?_

_And suddenly all sound stopped. It was as if he were in a vacuum, nothing surrounding him besides the thick black void and a suffocating silence._

_Then just as suddenly as everything stopped, a deep rumble carried in the darkness, like the roar of thunder being echoed of great mountains. It stopped right before it reached its peak and all that was heard was a minute whisper._

_“_ It _.”_

* * *

When Danny woke up the next morning he, again, had no memory of the dream but the vague sound of a train whistle and the feeling that something bad was about to happen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha r u reaDY fOR SHIT TO GO DOWN?! cause it will in a few chapters trust me


	14. A Confrontation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmao early update: merry holidays ya'll

 

> _"You taught me the courage of stars before you left. How light carries on endlessly, even after death." - Saturn by Sleeping At Last_

Danny was visiting Clockwork for one of his usual lessons when the older ghost said to him, “I’d like to show you something, Daniel. I think you’ll like it.”

Curious, Danny acquiesced with an “okay,” and followed a grinning Clockwork to another room in his lair.

“You have likely noticed by now,” Clockwork drawled, “that I have many different ways of looking into the future and observing time in general.”

“Yeah,” Danny nodded, thinking back to rooms he had been in so far; the Hall of Mirrors, the Crystal Ballroom, and Time Stream Keep, as he had been told they were called. He wondered why Clockwork had so many different time devices if they all did the same thing.

“They all show me different things, Daniel, some important, some mundane” Clockwork stopped in front of a large, pitch black door and turned to face his ward. “But this one is rather special.”

Clockwork opened the door and Danny gasped.

The entirety of the room was just as black as the door had been, the void like darkness making it hard to see where the room even ended but, more importantly, it was also covered in stars. Clockwork ushered him in and Danny felt like he was actually in space. Each little pinprick of light was moving about sedately, their colorful glows lighting up the room in a spectacular dance. He spotted roving constellations and planets. He spied the little dipper and if he looked closely enough he could see Jupiter. He turned his legs to mist and floated up among the stars, ecstatic.

He looked back down to CW, a giant smile lighting up his face, and a laugh escaping him breathlessly, “This place is awesome!”

“I thought you would enjoy it,” the Master of Time said affably. He gestured for Danny to stand beside him and waited for the excited teen to float down.

“What do stars have to do with Time, though, CW?” Danny questioned.

“The cosmos has been here since the very beginning of it, Daniel. In ages past, humans used stars for prediction and for puzzling out events in the present. Have you heard of Astrology?”

“Yeah,” Danny said with a nod, “Sam’s really into it. That’s all the Zodiac stuff, right? Sam says I’m an Aries.”

“Yes,” Clockwork replied with a chuckle, “you do seem like the type.”

Danny narrowed his eyes, “I feel like I should be offended by that.”

“Hmm,” the older ghost hummed with a smirk, “perhaps.”

“Hey!”

Clockwork laughed, “Let’s move on with our lesson for the day, shall we?”

Danny groaned, “Do we have to?”

The Time Keeper chuckled again at his ward’s feigned reluctance. He knew as well as Danny how much the teen actually enjoyed learning about the Ghost Zone and Time itself.

“Yes,” he answered softly and ushered Danny out of the room. He looked back at the room with a frown, bad omens spelled out in the stars, before firmly closing the door. What was to come would pass and things would be better in the end, it would not due to dwell on things he already knew.

“Well,” Danny drawled, bringing the other out of his thoughts, “I mean, if you insist.”

Clockwork smiled at the halfa as they walked back to the main Hall of his lair.

Yes, things would be better in the end. 

* * *

 

Vladimir Masters was enraged beyond comprehension. All of his hard work, _gone_. All of his time and effort, wasted. From a simple little malfunction. His precious Maddie Android had overheated just a bit too much and- then he lost her and half of his lab. It was infuriating.

It had taken time to clean up the entire mess and at the end of it he discovered that the DNA sample he so coveted was also destroyed in the explosion. An Android he could rebuild or buy another, a DNA sample he could not.

Which is what brought him to his current location, speeding through the Ghost Zone as Plasmius to get to the Portal the Fenton’s owned and hopefully swipe another sample from Maddie. He was determined to keep with the plan he had, he wouldn’t let a little set back stop him from achieving his dreams.

He just hoped the little badger wouldn’t be there to stop him in some misplaced sense of heroics. Ah, but speak of the devil and he shall appear. Young Daniel was floating before him in Phantom form with a guarded expression.

“What are you up to, Vlad?” Danny questioned icily. He had just been on his way home from Clockwork’s lair when he saw Vlad flying through the Zone like a madman. The fruitloop was definitely up to something and Danny was going to put a stop to it before it could escalate.

“I need your mother’s DNA, Daniel,” Vlad growled, uncharacteristically straightforward. He wasn’t going to lie when it would only make Daniel more suspicious of him. No amount of honeyed words make the boy trust him, so there was no point. No, getting right to the matter at hand was the best way get Daniel on his side for this.

“And what do you want with that, Plasmius?” Danny spit the name like a curse word, contempt rolling off of him like waves. Vlad may have been rather quiet with his plans as of late but that didn’t change the fact he still wanted Danny’s father dead and was lusting after his mother. He wasn’t going to let Vlad anywhere _near_ his family.

“What I do with it is my own concern,” Vlad said sternly, impatiently, “all you need to know is that I’ll never bother your happy little family again. _If_ you let me have this.”

Danny paused, remembering Clockwork’s words from all those weeks ago. Was this what caused Vlad to stop plotting against his family? Just giving him his mother’s DNA? Danny hesitated, one the one hand, if Clockwork was right, this would mean that he’d never have to worry about Vlad again, and Vlad was a very powerful opponent to make be rid of. It would take so much worry off his shoulders if this meant the fruitloop finally left him alone.

On the other hand… Vlad looked unhinged at the moment. His hair was falling out of the weird spikes he usually kept it in as Plasmius and his face hadn’t lost the pinched expression the entire conversation. Danny could see his fists were clenched tightly and if he could see through his gloves, he would bet that Vlad’s knuckles were white from the tension. What really set Danny on edge was the look in his eyes. They may have been pure red, including the sclera, but you could see the frantic desperation in them. Vlad had always been a crazed up fruitloop… but this was different. It was almost like he was losing control, and the thought scared Danny a little.

“How do I know you’ll keep your word, Plasmius?” Danny asked cautiously. He was already leaning towards a decision but he wasn’t completely certain yet.

“You don’t,” Vlad spat, “but I do intend to keep my word, Daniel. Underneath it all, I _am_ an honorable man.”

Danny snorted, “Yeah, sure, cheese head. Whatever you say.”

Vlad narrowed his eyes but said nothing more. He couldn’t push Daniel on this or all of his plans may fall to ruin. He would not fall prey to his childish taunts, either. He could wait, even with the desperate burning in his chest and the inescapable feeling there was something missing. That there was something off.

A tense silence fell between the two. Danny taking his time to come to a decision and Vlad trying his hardest not to blast the teen and get what he wanted that way. But this would be so much easier with Daniel’s cooperation, so he withheld from outright violence.

The moment dragged on, Vlad growing more impatient with every second, before Danny finally gave a terse nod.

“Fine,” he said, circling Vlad to be at the other Halfa’s back. He didn’t trust the older man enough, or at all really, to fly with his back to him.

“ _But_ ,” he stated forcefully while giving Vlad a nudge to get him to start flying, “you’re not setting foot in my house. I’ll get some hair from her hairbrush and bring it back to you. You will wait outside the portal or you will regret it.”

Vlad bit his tongue so he wouldn’t snap at the boy. Who did Daniel think he was? Vlad was far stronger than the insolent little pest could ever understand. The only reason he didn’t outright fight him was because it was more _convenient_ this way. Vlad could do what he wanted and no amount of cocksure witticisms and threats would stop him.

But he would follow along with whatever Daniel demanded, so long as he got what he wanted. The boy would be out of his hair soon enough, if his plan went smoothly and he wasn’t met with disaster again…

It took no time at all to reach the Fenton portal, the swirling green vortex simply floating in the eerie atmosphere of the Zone.

“I’ll be back soon,” Danny said firmly as circled Vlad again, never letting the other see his back, “so don’t try anything funny.”

With that he turned around and quickly zipped through the portal, leaving Vlad to wait.

And he would wait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "you look me in the eyeballs and tell me that Daniel Fenton Phantom isn't an Aries"


	15. A Loss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!!!!! important!: Okay so this is the Angst Chapter™ and this is where I remind you this story is tagged with Minor Character Death. There's nothing graphic but... Danny does go into shock and starts thinking things like "It's not real" and other such things so please take that into account before reading. 
> 
> chapter summary: ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

> _"Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light." - Dylan Thomas  
> _

Clockwork watched in trepidation and with a crushing sense of guilt as young Daniel flew off from his Tower. It was partially his fault, the harsh trial his ward would have to go through, because this was an outcome that could have been easily prevented with intervention.

But he had refrained.

He had done nothing as he distracted Daniel with a lesson today. Keeping the boy safe from harm and then sending him out at just the right time. He hadn’t said a word.

He had done nothing as a beast of a ghost made its way closer and closer to a rift in the Zone. He could have stopped it but he didn’t. He could have warned Daniel, but he didn’t.

And he had done nothing, much like those wretched Observants, as Time played out a horrible scene. Surely, Daniel would hate him for this.

And for once, Clockwork had no idea what was to come next, as he was too afraid to look.

But he would watch, and he would wait.

\----------------------------------------------------------------  


Danny was stepping toward the end of the portal when he hit a wall. A very jagged and not-supposed-to-be-there wall. He felt around it, trying to figure out what was wrong but was only met with more sharp thorns keeping him at bay. He turned his hand intangible and tried again.

His hand phased right through and he brought it back. So whatever was keeping him here wasn’t ghostly in nature and this definitely wasn’t the same as when the ghost portal was off or the doors were closed.

A feeling of dread settled in the pit of his stomach. Something was _wrong_ about this.

He turned completely intangible and flew up, wanting to get an aerial view before figuring out the problem. His parents were probably up to something silly again. He flew until he was hovering in the air above his house.

Or rather, the air above what was _supposed_ to be his house.

Danny landed on top of a large pile of debris, the still-settling dust sending him into a coughing fit and obstructing his vision. It was almost as if the house had only just fallen. Maybe it had.

His mind was blank, not knowing what to think or how to react. Where was his house? What happened here? Why wasn’t his house here? _What happened?_

Danny crouched down and shifted through the splintered wood at his feet, not knowing what else to do. He recognized the color of the paint on a woodchip he picked up, it was from the kitchen table. He dropped it and fell back until he was sitting in the shards of wood. How was he supposed to feel? To react? His house was just... gone.

To him, it seemed to have simply ceased to exist, the fact jarring and strange. What would happen now? His house had been sturdy, unbreakable, _home_. He'd never lived anywhere else in his life! Fentonworks had always been his home! He couldn't imagine living anywhere else.

It wasn’t like he hadn’t thought about this happening before, because he certainly had, especially with the amount of explosions, and later, ghost attacks, that seemed to plague the place. But maybe that’s what shocked him most about this, his home had survived _so much_ and had never shown a single sign of toppling.

In fact, his father had boasted to him once that their house had been reinforced so securely that _“It could withstand an earthquake up to magnitude 7, Danno!”_

Suddenly the thought crashed into him, _his father_.

Hadn’t his parents said they would be working in the lab all day today?

Frantically, Danny turned intangible again and flew down to the lab that was buried under the rubble. He searched in a panic for any sign of his parents but it was hard to see anything in the dust and darkness and jagged scraps of metal. It was a wasteland, bathed in a pale red glow from the emergency lights that were still working by some miracle. But it made it harder for Danny to _see_ and he need to _find his parents_. They were probably trapped somewhere! They needed him to save them! _He had to find them_.

He heart was beating triple time and his breathing was erratic. He _couldn’t_. They weren't _anywhere_ , they were lost. They were going to _die_ and it would be all his fault. Because _he_ couldn't find them. Tears began gather in the corner of his eyes as panic set in further. _He couldn’t find them_.

Eventually, Danny ended up finding a clear spot in the lab that he could sit down in tangibly. He needed to stop and think. He needed to breathe properly. He needed to stop crying.

_He needed to find his parents_.

There was a shifting of brick and metal, a deep groan coming from the building supports sounding across the room. Dust fell from overhead and Danny turned intangible again, just in case, waiting for it to settle. He couldn't deal with this right now, he had to save his parents first. It would not do for the building to collapse before then. He moved to get up again before the scraps of metal shifted again, making him pause.

Vlad, looking terrifyingly furious, emerged from the debris that had been blocking the portal, sending it all flying into the room.

Danny shielded himself with his arms, forgetting that any brick or metal would pass through him, and curled into a tighter ball in his corner of the lab.

“I have been waiting _long enough_ , Daniel!” Vlad snarled to the room at large, prepared to fight the boy if he had to, before stopping and actually taking in his surroundings.

Vlad’s eyes were wide as he took in the scene of destruction, took in the sight of what used to be the Fentonworks lab, and took in the sight of a huddled Daniel Fenton in the corner. He froze.

“ _No_ ,” he whispered brokenly. Shock passed quickly before turning to fury.

“NO!” he roared.

Vlad used his ghostly strength to fling debris out of his way, tearing through the mess of broken brick and metal, searching for a sign of life. Danny watched, unable to move or think and kept to his corner as the far more powerful ghost ripped through everything with his bare hands.

Something in him had snapped.

“JACK!” was the first name to leave his lips, shocking Danny and Vlad himself. But Vlad didn’t care enough to linger on the thought, he was far too busy anxiously pulling the lab apart. “MADDIE!”

Another groan sounded in the room and part of the ceiling caved in over the area where the portal was. A large bit of building slammed into the machine that kept the portal running, making it spark and then go out. The portal flickered out of existence. Neither person in the room gave it any attention.

“JA-,” Vlad suddenly stopped as he threw a heavy piece of broken equipment out of the way and caught sight of a familiar blue hazmat suit. He dropped to his knees and began desperately clearing away wreckage, revealing more and more.

The last chunk of brick in his hand fell away with a resounding thunk as Madeline Fenton’s body was revealed. She wasn’t breathing.

Vlad wasn’t breathing either.

Danny watched, completely still, as thoughts raced too fast in his head to comprehend, _no no no no no no_.

Immediately Vlad was leaning over Maddie, hands desperately pushing against her chest trying to get her to breathe again.

_This couldn’t be happening._

Vlad continued doing CPR for what felt like hours but Maddie never stirred. Tears were running down his face and eventually he stopped, he was shaking too hard to continue.

His obsession was gone. His sole reason for being had vanished forever. He had nothing to focus on, nothing to strive for. His purpose, his guide, his entire soul, everything. _His obsession was unattainable. No more._

He tilted his head back and he screamed.

And he screamed.

Danny watched from his corner in terror as pink flames began to engulf the other the man as his grief and rage reached a new height. His mother was dead and Vlad was going to be eaten alive from his own ghostly fire.

Something in Vlad had snapped and it was horrifying.

And Danny was frozen to the spot, going into shock. This wasn’t happening, none of this could be real. _It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be_.

Vlad’s roar reached a new decibel and Danny had to cover his ears. If this got much louder it could be classified as a ghostly wail.

A swirling blue portal appeared and Clockwork stepped out, phasing through all the wreckage blocking his path. He swiftly made his way over to the halfa engulfed in flames and jabbed a quick hand into a certain spot on Vlad’s neck without hesitation.

Vlad went limp instantly and Clockwork laid him to the side.

The elder ghost cleared the rest of the dust covering Maddie’s body and respectfully crossed the woman’s arms across her chest. He then set about recovering Jack Fenton’s body, which lay buried under the machinery beside his wife, when that was done he did the same to Jack as he did to Maddie. He couldn't do anything else for them for now.

Clockwork then turned to Danny, seeing the boy frozen still with wide unseeing eyes. He removed his cloak and made his way towards his ward, settling the heavy fabric over the young teen’s shoulders. He didn’t quite know what else to do.

“You need to come with me, Daniel. Can you do that?” he asked gently.

Danny nodded slowly but didn’t break his gaze away from where his parents lay.

Clockwork carefully pulled the boy to his feet, making the other intangible through touch so he could move about the ruins without hurting himself. He knew the boy didn't have the energy or thought to turn intangible himself. Danny moved mechanically, without thought, Clockwork’s cape warm over his trembling frame.

The older ghost pulled them along back to Vlad before he hoisted the man up onto his shoulder all without releasing Danny’s hand.

He opened up another portal and slipped back into his lair.

The concerned chime of a Grandfather clock echoed in the room, but Clockwork ignored it in favor of gently placing Vlad down on a bed. He guided Danny over to another room and made sure he was settled in a bed before softly closing the door and floating down the corridor.

They were both in his care now, and what must be done had been done.

He only hoped he would be forgiven for this.


	16. A Theory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haHA merry belated shitscram errbody B))

 

> _"Something is not right with me, something is not right with me, something is not right with me." - Cold War Kids_

Clockwork stared down at the still unconscious, and human, form of Vlad. After ripping himself apart like that Clockwork was worried about the man’s wellbeing, he had used up so much energy in his fury that he had reverted back to his human counterpart. But the reaction was understandable, he supposed. Vladimir had lost his obsession after all.

Losing an obsession; being kept from fulfilling it, or having access to it, or being cut off from it entirely, _destroys_ a ghost. In many cases the ghost doesn’t survive, they tear themselves apart and eventually End themselves; sometimes on accident, most times on purpose.

Clockwork hesitantly reached out a shaking hand to tuck back a lock of hair that had fallen onto Vlad’s sleeping face. Watching this lonely man, he had come to care very deeply for him, so deeply that Clockwork was afraid of his own affections. There were very few things he wouldn’t do to make him happy in the end.

Which was why it hurt him, to break the older halfa he held dear, and rip him apart like this without lifting a finger.

But it was the only way to set him _free_.

Then there was Daniel.

He hated, absolutely _hated_ , that this was a choice he’d had to make. He hated the fact that he had made _both_ of them suffer, because he cared for both of the halfas deeply, even if in different ways. Daniel had lost his parents and it was all his fault. He made the decision. He wouldn’t hold it against the boy, either, if he never forgave him for what he did. Clockwork didn’t even know if Danny would, he was far too afraid to look.

But first Daniel would need to heal and there was a far better place for that than Clockwork’s lair.

He’d have to pay a visit to Andrew.

\-------------------------------------------

The Ghostwriter was not happy to see him at all, but Clockwork didn’t blame him overly much. Especially with the news he was bringing.

“Please, Andrew,” Clockwork said evenly as he blocked an ectoplasmic blast, “you must calm down.”

“Then tell me what you want, you _asinine alarm clock_!” Ghostwriter shouted back from the door to his lair, almost seeming to guard the entrance. He might have still been shouting, but he did stop shooting.

“It’s Daniel,” Clockwork stated gravely, getting right to the point.

“Danny?” that certainly caught the Ghostwriter’s attention, his anger suddenly dropping from his face and his body going just a bit slack before panic set in and he rushed towards the other ghost, “What’s wrong with him?!”

“He’s gone into a catatonic state, and I’m afraid I don’t know how long it will last,” it pained him to say it, but it was true. Clockwork, Master of Time, had no idea how long his apprentice would remain in his semi-coma.

“ _WHAT?!_ ” Andrew was livid, if this was some kind of sick joke…

Clockwork flinched slightly at the force of Andrew’s ire, he deserved every bit of anger thrown his way, “Andrew,” he beseeched softly, “just come with me and see him.”

Andrew drew in short irritated breaths, trying his hardest to calm down, but how could he, really? If what Clockwork was saying was actually true then that meant- that meant Danny was hurt, and that was something he did not want to consider.

“Fine,” Andrew managed to bite out as he slammed the doors to his lair and stomped down the steps towards Clockwork. Vidya released an indignant screech at the treatment but he ignored her, she would be fine. Danny- He might not be.

Clockwork turned and led the way, speeding off into the Ghost Zone with Andrew hot on his tail. They made it to the Tower in record time.

Clockwork briskly led the way to the room Danny was staying in, knowing that Andrew was working himself up into a furiously worried frenzy behind him.

“He’s in here,” he announced quietly as he opened the door with a subdued creak of the hinges. Andrew took hesitant steps into the darkened bedroom, not quite wanting to confirm the state Danny would likely be in.

He made his way to the bed and dropped down to his knees beside it as he took in Danny’s blank expression and glassy eyes, staring up at nothing.

He smoothly brushed a lock of hair out of Danny’s face before cupping his face with his hands.

“Oh, mon petit cher,” he whispered. The teen didn’t react. It broke Andrew’s heart.

“Why is he like this?” Andrew questioned, bitterness seeping into his tone. He didn’t stop gazing at Danny all the while.

“The event to cause this?” Clockwork began, “His parents were found dead.”

Andrew drew in a sharp breath, _Oh Danny…_

“And why is he practically in a _coma_?” he growled, one hand was clenched in a fist while the other gently carded through Danny’s hair, hoping to sooth both the teen and himself.

“That, I do not know for certain,” the other ghost sounded tired and weary, “but there is a theory.”

“You don’t _know_?” Andrew gave him an incredulous glare, Danny was hurting and catatonic and the being who claimed to know everything, the being who was _supposed_ to be Danny’s guardian, didn’t _know why_.

Clockwork frowned at Andrew, “Not for certain. Danny’s situation is unprecedented. I only hope it’s temporary.”

“Unprecedented?” Andrew echoed, “What about the book?! Didn’t I _just_ hand over the Journal of the First Halfa to you? Surely there must be something in there!”

“Do you think I have not looked?” Clockwork snapped, “There is nothing in there about _this_! Let me explain to you _just_ what has happened to the boy.”

The Master of Time took a deep and calming breath, though it did nothing to ease his frayed and worried nerves.

“Daniel has lost his _obsession_ ,” he started looking down at the boy mournfully. Andrew sucked in a sharp inhale, it was a wonder Danny hadn’t gone berserk.

“But he has only lost it in part. Daniel’s obsession was keeping his loved ones safe from harm, so seeing his parents gone put him in an extreme amount of shock. But,” he paused, gathering his thoughts, “in one part because of his halfa status and another part because of the nature of his obsession, I think he will be able to recover.”

“What do you mean, because of his halfa status?” Andrew readjusted himself so he was no longer kneeling on the floor, but instead sitting on the bed beside Danny, still gently stroking his hair. He searched for the teen’s hand and held it, reassured by the warmth he felt thrumming there.

“Daniel’s physiology is a bit unique,” Clockwork brought a chair over to the bed and collapsed into it slowly, tiredly. “He is bound with his ghostly counterpart so seamlessly that there is little to no distinction between Fenton and Phantom. It’s a unique aspect that comes from the way he gained his powers, ectoplasm fusing into his DNA itself. Because of this his human half and his ghost half counter balance each other.”

“Meaning?”

“He isn’t bound by his obsession like you and I would be. He has more autonomy than that. I think, I _hope_ , that because of that, and because he hasn’t lost all of his loved ones, that he’ll recover with time and care.”

Andrew nodded and turned back to watch Danny’s slow and even breathing, it reminded him that Danny was still _there_ , still existing. It was also strange to look at Clockwork as he was now, desolate and depressed, hanging his head and slumped over the chair like a weary old man. It made him uneasy to see the usually unruffled ghost so disheveled.

He moved to face Clockwork just slightly when he heard the other speak in a small voice.

“You must take him back with you, Andrew, he will fare far better with you and Vidya than with me.”

Andrew decided not to question the older ghost, simply giving him a nod. It would be a relief after all, to have Danny so close to him in his own lair, he felt uncomfortable when he was away from Vidya for too long but he refused to abandon Danny either.

“I must go pick up Jasmine from the airport,” Clockwork said, rising from the chair and waving a hand over his body, taking on a nondescript human appearance with the gesture. “Would you mind housing her as well? I think it would be best for Daniel to have what’s left of his family close by.”

“His older sister, correct?” Andrew would be willing to have a guest if it meant Danny would have a better chance at recovery, even if it would be strange and awkward. At Clockwork’s nod he agreed, “I’ll take her in.”

“I’ll bring her back to your lair then,” and with that Clockwork left in a swirling blue portal.

Andrew took a few more minutes to sit and watch Danny’s steady breathing before rising and gently lifting the teen into his arms, his head cradled on Andrew’s shoulder.

He hoped Clockwork was right about him being able to recover, because seeing Danny in such a state was agony to him.

But for now, all they could do was hope.


	17. A Casualty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha hi

> _"Sometimes things have to get worse before they can get better. Never give up." - Haley Knight_

Danny was floating and he was in pain, those were the few things he could decipher from the situation he was currently in. He couldn’t open his eyes, and frankly, he didn’t feel like he wanted to. It was comfortable and warm wherever he was. A dull throbbing noise, the same noise you hear as your pulse underwater, was the only sound around him. A warm floating fluid sensation was the only thing he could feel. 

That, and the pain.

It was deep, deep ache inside his chest, something that emanated right from his core. Throbbing, like the sound of his pulse, and sharp, as if he had formed a giant sliver of ice and pierced his own heart with it. He wanted to cry and clutch his heart, scream and kick things in his anger, he wanted rage and grieve. But he couldn’t move. Couldn’t twitch a finger or an eyelid. He just floated, motionless in the strange warmth that almost felt like comfort.

His parents were dead.

The thought was… strange to him. He almost couldn’t believe it was true, they had been such constants in his life. They were his parents after all. Maybe they weren’t the absolute best; they had ruined almost every Christmas of his life, they often forgot about their children in favor of experiments, they were reckless, they were forgetful, they were overexcited. But they had always _been there_. 

Maybe not for everything, sure, but they had always cared at least. They _tried_. And they had loved him and he had loved them and they had been a _family_. He might have been afraid of them, afraid of what would happen should they find out his secret, what they might be capable of as scientists over parents, but he still loved them. His big, goofy father and his fierce, protective mother. They were there when he always needed him most.

Every skinned knee, every homework problem, every fight in the sandbox, every hurt feeling, and every serious dilemma he had ever faced. If he went to them for help, and even sometimes when he didn’t, they would be there. His dad would offer him a ridiculous bit of advice, a smile and a hug, and if he was feeling particularly down, then a piece of fudge to go with it all. His mom would kiss his cheeks, give him _real_ advice, and card her fingers through his hair when they hugged, just for as long as he needed it. 

He’d never have that again.

And it _hurt_. 

It hurt more than anything in the world and he couldn’t even comprehend it. He couldn’t even _think_ about it. The pain in his chest, sharp and cold and _throbbing_ , would only get worse and he would only want to cry and he _couldn’t_.

It wasn’t fair! It wasn’t right!

_Why did they have to die? Why couldn’t he save them? Why couldn’t it have been **him**?_

He wanted to scream but he couldn’t.

He just- continued to float… and float. He didn’t know if he’d ever stop.

* * *

Jasmine Fenton was very, very confused.

Here she was, in the airport, having just gotten off her flight after her third semester at Harvard and she couldn’t figure out just _where_ her brother had gone to. He was supposed to pick her up and while she knew that ghosts could have delayed him, she also knew that he would have at least _called_ to tell her. At the most he would have sent one of his friends to pick her up for him.

She had tried calling him, she had tried calling the house and her parents and she had even tried calling Sam and Tucker. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. 

It made her nervous more than anything.

Because she knew that some of the worst case scenarios running through her mind were all too likely to actually happen. Anything was possible, _anything_ could have happened to them. She was trying her hardest not to panic in the middle of the airport just because her teenage brother was late picking her up, but honestly it’s been five hours and it was hard not to.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder and she almost jumped out of her skin. 

“Jasmine?” a smooth voice she could barely call familiar asked her.

“Yes?” she replied warily, eyeing the man in front of her. He was very… average. Average height, average build, average clothes, brown hair and brown eyes. Even his face was oddly… nondescript. Like he was the world’s most average man, trying to blend in with the crowd. It made her tense.

“My apologies but Daniel was unable to pick you up,” he said calmly, “I’m here in his place.”

“What happened to him?” Jazz questioned immediately, fear and worry rising, “And just _who_ are you?”

“Your brother isn’t faring well,” the man said grimly, looking almost guilty for whatever reason, “and I shall explain everything on the way.”

Jazz’s heart started beating triple time and her hands were clammy and trembling. “That still doesn’t explain who you are.”

“I’m a ghost,” he said matter-of-factly, “I am called Clockwork.”

Suddenly Jazz remembered where she had heard his voice before. It was only once and very briefly when Danny had introduced them because she had been curious about the ghost her brother had deemed his mentor. She relaxed just the slightest, at least she could trust the person in front of her. But there was still something wrong with Danny.

She nodded sternly before gesturing, “Lead the way.”

And with that, they left the airport.

* * *

Both Samantha Manson and Tucker Foley didn’t know what to do as they watched yet another building fold like a house of cards before them. Half the town lay in ruin and there was no stopping the destruction. House after house, building after building, just came toppling down with no explanation. 

After years of experience battling ghosts the two teens had figured out that it was probably a ghost causing this chaos, because really what were the chances of it being anything else, but they didn’t know which one. They couldn’t even figure out _why_.

“There goes Dash’s house,” Tucker said as they raced down the block to catch up with the line of destruction.

“Yeah, hopefully everyone got out okay,” Sam murmured back before saying in a strained tone, “we don’t need any more casualties.”

Both of them fell into a grim silence, remembering the scene they had stumbled upon when they had first made their way to Danny’s house. They had planned to hang out but… obviously that wasn’t going to happen any time soon. Danny’s house was nothing but rubble and his parents- his parents were just lying there. They had looked like they were just sleeping. It shook them down to their core, they had never seen death first hand before even if they fought ghosts so often, but what worried them most was that Danny was nowhere to be seen.

That was the moment they called 911, getting the police to come and… do whatever they were supposed to do in this situation. Then they heard another building collapse and noticed the debris of the surrounding houses. 

They hadn’t noticed, not after seeing that the trademark Fentonworks sign was missing, but multiple houses down the block had also fallen. 

Then they signaled the evacuation alarm. 

The alarm had been set up sometime last year after yet _another_ ghost attack caused city-wide property damage. The Fentons and City Council had worked together on a project that would ensure people were alerted at the first sign of a particularly violent ghost and knew to evacuate the closest premises. They had come up with quite a few physical panic buttons set up around the city that any bystander could run to and push for help, while also developing a special hotline, open 24/7 that would raise the old alarms previously set up in the city for nuclear bomb threats. It one called in to the hotline you could specify the area and the operator would trigger the alarm for it. It was rather clever.

Immediately after finishing the call with the police, Sam had speed dialed the hotline, calling in for the entire city. The operator had blustered at first, insisting that they couldn’t just evacuate the whole city like that, but after explaining the wreckage (especially the destruction of Fentonworks) they had quickly changed their tune and rang the alarm for the entire town.

The majority of the citizens, as it looked so far, seemed to have gotten out safely because of the warning. 

But the houses were still falling like dominoes and even though they were trying their hardest, running after the mess with thermoses in hand, they still felt hopeless, still felt useless. They were only human, they couldn’t catch ghosts of this caliber on their own. They needed help, desperately. So that begged the question… 

_Where was Danny?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "It's always darkest before dawn" and all that yaknow, but i think things will just get dark again?? thats how the sky works at least


	18. A Vow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *rises from the dead* im so sorry but lmao my computer died on me TWICE so i lost my ALL my data TWICE but now i have a new laptop and this chapter is like 3 thousand words please forgive me

> _“Memories warm you up from the inside. But they also tear you apart.” - Haruki Murakami_

Vlad was on fire. He was burning at a temperature comparable to the heat of solar flares from the _sun_ ; like his skin was liable to melt right off his body, his muscles, his bones.

It was heavy and it was searing. It enveloped him in humid blankets, smothering and unbearable yet it also branded into his very soul, sharp and stinging.

He had felt grief before, tasted it at its most poignant in the earliest of his years, but it had _never_ felt like this, never felt like he was strung up in the middle of a _pyre_. The part of him that was dead, the part of him that was living as a ghost, was slowly eating him alive, eating him alive with _fire_ , and consuming what little he had left of his humanity, what little he had left of _life_.

His entire reason for being, the entire reason his ghost half hadn’t imploded in on itself shortly after  forming, and the entire reason he had even bothered to _live on_ , was gone; dead, destroyed, wrenched from his very hands in such a lackluster exit (he hadn’t even seen it happen, he hadn’t even had the _chance_ to stop it, it hadn’t even seemed _real_ ) that he was left bereft and burning and screaming at something he couldn’t fully fathom.

Then suddenly, or maybe it was over the course of many hours, he was plunged into what felt like the icy depths of the ocean. Everything was black and everything was cold. The fire had turned to ice and it soothed his burns, chilled the fire, and even cooled the gaping wounds in his soul.

He could feel vague murmurings, gentle and quiet and deep, attempt to comfort him. They did, just slightly, even if he could understand what they whispered through the distortion of the frigid waves lapping over him.

Then the scene changed yet again, yanking him in a new direction entirely.

Suddenly, he was swimming in a sea of snapshots from his memories. He was plunged into a vignette before he could even process the lack of pain.

_Vladimir Mikhailovich Masters was running late for his first class on his first day in his first year at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and he was panicking about it. He was dashing madly across courtyards and sidewalks and roads. He couldn’t even find the building! Let alone the classroom! This was going to ruin the rest of his entire college career, he’d be doomed to fail if he started off on the wrong foot like this!_

_He wasn’t expecting to slam into a solid body seconds after frantically looking at the paper where he’d written the classroom number down, but he did anyway. He rebounded off a thick chest and would have fallen to the ground had an arm not shot out and kept him steady._

_“Sorry there, dude, didn’t see you!”_

_The voice was loud and boisterous and Vlad barely had time to process it before he muttered out an, “It’s fine.”_

_“You lost?” the large and overly happy man asked, slinging an arm around Vlad’s shoulders in an overly familiar way, but Vlad didn’t shrug him off. He seemed like a nice enough guy and he didn’t want to make any enemies just yet._

_“Totally. Could you help me out?”_

_“For sure!” the man, whom Vlad noticed was clad in a glaring orange shirt and bright white lab coat (stained with suspicious green splotches), eagerly plucked the paper from his hands and read it over before physically maneuvering him to face the opposite direction they had been facing._

_“You’ll be wanting that building over there,” he pointed with a grin, “The stairs to the third floor are on the left. Good luck, dude!”_

_Vlad smiled back at him in relief and gave a friendly wave as he rushed off towards the proper classroom, not knowing how well he would remember this moment for the rest of his life and how much he would come to resent it._

Vlad was back to floating in blackness and curled up around icy fingers as nostalgia pierced through the shreds of his heart.

_Oh, Jack…_

He’d been such a kind man, oblivious yes, and definitely on the bumbling side but he still had brilliant ideas, a brilliant smile, and the friendliest disposition (no matter _what_ happened) that Vlad had ever encountered in a person.

After the accident, and with how warped and jaded he’d become after that, he’d almost forgotten how smitten he’d been with the _both_ of them. He may have come to hate Jack, later in life, but he couldn’t forget that Maddie hadn’t been the only one he’d had a crush on in college.

It only made the pain, not the fire or the ice but the deep ache within his core, that much stronger.

This time he dived willingly into a new tidal pool of memories.

_Vlad was laughing so hard he couldn’t feel the carbonated tingle of the soda before he choked on his drink and it went up his nose._

_“Jack!” he crowed after he finished his coughing fit, “That was horrible!”_

_“Don’t die on me there, V-man!” Jack belted out as he laughed as he slammed a rough hand down onto his friend’s back in a poor attempt to quell the coughing, “And don’t lie, dude,” Jack grinned, “you love my jokes!”_

_Vlad sighed and gave a weak chuckle, “A little too much sometimes, even when they’re totally bogus.”_

_Jack laughed again, the sound of it filling the small diner just off the college campus they were currently situated in. A cheerfully feminine voice cut him off and caught both of their attentions._

_“What’s so funny, boys?” Maddie asked, looking just a bit tired and covered in a bit too much ectoplasm, smiled as she slid into the booth with them, sitting beside Jack._

_“Aw, it was nothing Mads,” Jack said as he lounged back against worn red vinyl of the booth, arm coming up to hang behind the redhead beside him._

_Maddie slumped into the form beside her and Vlad felt a pang of jealousy, a twinge of hurt, and a stab of guilt at the thought of being jealous of his friends._

_“Jack was just telling another lame pun,” Vlad said as he tried to laugh off his feelings. They were his_ friends _, and they could be comfortable with each other and he would_ not _get jealous about it because he would not let his… other feelings for the both of them get in the way of his friendship with them. They were the only people he had, he couldn’t afford to let them go because of something so trivial like that._

_Maddie snorted as she stole a fry from Vlad’s plate. “When is Jack not telling another heinous pun?”_

_Vlad nodded sagely, “For sure,” before he broke into a grin at the sight of Jack’s pout._

_“Assholes,” Jack muttered before he joined Vlad in grinning (he could never help it, he was just so naturally cheerful) and they all joked and laughed together well into the night._

It was one fond memory of many that Vlad held dear to his heart. Yet most of them had been locked away for nearly twenty years after the fact because of the awful influence of his ghostly half and his poor coping mechanisms after the trauma of his accident.

The ache in his heart intensified yet again and the burning that had disappeared with the icy water came back to sear into his bones. He writhed in pain at the feel of it, his lungs feeling clogged and choked and he rasped out a pitiful whine from his sandpaper throat.

He felt like he was dying all over again before he was washed away into yet another memory.

_Vlad was absently running his fingers along the stark white sheets of his hospital bed, not having the presence of mind to do much else with how sick he was, when another horrendous coughing fit sent him reeling and spluttering and struggling to breathe._

_It eventually subsided but he was left feeling weaker than before and his limbs felt shaky and new, like he no longer had control over them, like they were floating away from him. He felt sick down to his core, his face was still marred with horrible and itchy spots, and the fever that consumed him seemed to addle his brain._

_He reclined back in his bed, trembling and burning and mind gone blank. He couldn’t focus on anything. Even the red mist pooling in his lungs, a strange cinnamon sting to the taste of it, which made its way up his throat and expelled out his mouth in a pinkish cloud. He could only groan as adrenalin pumped its way into his body, his heart rate speeding up and his pupils dilating as his body prepared to fight whatever the red mist had signaled or flee from it._

_The beeping of the heart rate monitor sped up and sent the nurses into a flurry as they tried to fix it, tried to figure out what was wrong._

_Vlad closed his eyes and groaned again. This was the fourth time this had happened in as many days. It wasn’t the only strange thing happening to him either. He’d seen his hand disappear earlier, and he’d felt his entire leg sink through the hospital bed just the week before._

_It shouldn’t have been possible, and while he had a sinking suspicion as to why it_ was _, he didn’t have the mental capacity or the equipment to confirm it._

_He also had no one to talk to about it. No one he could bounce ideas off of. No one he could tell his theory to._

_Because Jack and Maddie had_ abandoned _him. Left him out to dry._

_“They’ve probably run off together by now,” a deadly hiss whispered in the back of his mind. His brain was too rattled to disagree. “Probably happy together, especially without_ you _around now.”_

_Some piece of Vlad still wanted to protest. They were his friends! They cared about him! He cared about them!_

_“Then_ where are they _?” the voice, definitely not his own, continued to hiss slither in the back of his mind, corrupting what was left of his feverish mind, taking away the last of his coherent thoughts._

_“They aren’t_ here _, that’s for certain. They no longer care for you. No one cares for you. No one cares_ about _you.”_

_“No,” he tried to fight back, “Maddie…”_

_“Oh, yes,” the voice said with enthusiasm, as if latching on to something new, “we could convince_ her _to like you again, perhaps. She might come to love you. But we would need to make her_ ours _.”_

_The thought felt tempting in some way, but there was still something wrong. He clutched at the white bedsheets as he set an empty glare to the blank beige walls that surrounded him. “Jack…”_

_“He stole her!” the voice immediately interjected, eager and dark, “He stole her away from us! Away from you! Everything is_ his _fault!”_

_The thoughts didn’t seem right, they felt terribly flawed. Yet they were so seductive, so tempting to believe. He had been filled with a directionless rage and a hopelessness that he didn’t know what to do with when he’d first been quarantined in the hospital, but now… Now he had a focus, now he knew what to hate and what he wanted to achieve._

_He fell to the words, he succumbed to the voice, and he let his mind drown in the twisted thoughts._

_“Yes…” he could no longer protest the voice, he no longer_ wanted _to._

Vlad was plunged back in to the freezing waters and thrust out of the memory with a gasp. He shivered, his entire body trembling and aching and cold as he thought about _that_ particular memory. His mind felt raw as he took in the implications of the scene. Had he truly been so influenced by his ghostly half all this time? Had he truly let his _obsession_ , one so twisted and foolhardy, take control of his life? Had he truly let it take over _who he was?_

Who was he _even_ , anymore? Where did Plasmius end and Vladimir begin, since they seemed to be so separate?

What was he going to do now?

What was there _to_ do?

“ _Vladimir…_ ” someone was calling out to him softly, it was the same voice that had murmured to him so soothingly before, had lulled him before.

“ _It’s time to wake up.”_

But he didn’t want to. He couldn’t face the world now, he couldn’t go back to the real world. He didn’t know what would happen when he did.

“ _All will be well, Vladimir, I promise. Now wake up, please_.”

He wallowed and waited just a bit more, but he trusted the voice and he would do as it asked. He would wake up and he would face the consequences and uncertainties.

Clockwork was waiting for him with a gentle smile when his eyelids finally fluttered opened. Vlad wondered idly where he was, the room behind the Master of Time being done up in deep purples and shrouded in shadow. He couldn’t think about much else aside from idle thoughts.

“Welcome back,” Clockwork said gently, “It’s nice to see you back in one piece.”

Vlad didn’t have a response to that. He didn’t feel like he was in one piece at all. He felt split completely in half.

Clockwork sighed at Vlad’s silence and looked to the corner of the room with a tired frown, “We have much to discuss, Vladimir, before things can progress as they should.”

“What,” Vlad croaked out with his scratchy throat, burning with the words still stuck there, “What is there to even speak of?”

What could they possibly even talk about? What could possibly be said about the situation? Jack and Maddie Fenton were dead and thus his obsession and entire reason for _being_.

“I know you’ve lost them and that it hurts,” Clockwork started, drawing Vlad’s attention back to him. “You’re in pain, I know, but you’re also free now.”

“Free?” Vlad rasped incredulously, “ _Free?_ ”

“Yes, you are free from the hatred and jealousy that Plasmius had poisoned you with,” Clockwork spoke quietly and steadily, his gaze never wavering from Vlad’s, “You are _free_ from the miasma of anger that used to cloud your judgement. You no longer need them.”

Vlad sat in silence, his brain trying to piece everything together, trying to process what was being said.

“You must come to your senses, Vladimir,” Clockwork said sternly, “You may have lost Jack and Maddie, your obsession, but so has Daniel.”

Vlad’s eyes widened, he’d forgotten all about the boy in his grief. And if Vlad was in such a state himself he could only imagine… Was Daniel even alright?

“He’s hurt and hiding from the world,” the ghost beside him sighed, “just as you had been. Just as you are still trying to do.”

Vlad narrowed his eyes at the accusation and turned a miffed glare in the ghost’s direction. He was not _hiding_ of all things; that was completely undignified for someone of his stature, someone of his pride.

Clockwork smirked before his eyes softened just a bit, his voice soft again, “I know you care from him, Vlad, just as many of us do. He has a spirit about him that’s endearing.”

Vald’s shoulder slumped and he gave weak nod. They may have fought, viciously in some cases, but he was still a boy, still someone Vlad had wanted to pull under his wing as an apprentice. Someone he had wanted as a son…

“He needs your help,” the other said solemnly.

Vlad nodded and took a deep breath before taking stock of his body. All his limbs seemed to be working, and everything _seemed_ to be in working order, even with the slight ache. He shifted in the bed he’d been placed in, no doubt by the Master of Time himself, and slowly lowered himself out of the bed, standing up with a small grunt.

“Where is he?”

Clockwork held out an arm to help steady him before pulling him out of the room, taking care to make sure he could keep up. It did funny things to the ache still present in his chest, but he ignored it.

In what seemed like very little time, likely an aftereffect of Clockwork’s powers, they stepped through the doors of the Ghostwriter’s lair. Vlad briefly wondered why Daniel was brought here of all places, but waved the thought off in favor of worry.

His question was answered anyway when he met the face of an overly anxious Ghostwriter, deep circles under his eyes and hands twisting at the scarf around his neck. He looked a mess and Vlad could speculate why. Hmm, he hadn’t known that Ghostwriter cared for Daniel, but with the fear and worry in the ghost’s eyes it was clear that he did.

He would think about it later because right now all he could think about was Daniel and how to help him. He needed to see how he was, needed to know that he was still alive if not well.

Clockwork led him to a darkened room and released his arm, letting him move further into it on his own. The shadow slipped over him as he moved closer to the bed where Daniel lay, looking for all the world like he was just sleeping.

Vlad placed a trembling hand on the boys’ shoulder and vowed to never let anything harm him ever again.

A promise he would vow to keep even at the risk of death.


	19. A Dream

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *punts this over the wall and runs away screaming*

> _"We do not succeed in changing things according to our desire, but gradually our desire changes." - Marcel Proust_

* * *

 

“What am I supposed to do?” Vlad asked, looking to Clockwork as he leaned heavily against the doorframe of Danny’s current room. “How can I help?”

He had to focus on Daniel now, not the pain still reverberating in his bones or the doubt and uncertainty creating a hole in his chest, he had to focus on how to help the boy, not his new identity crisis.

“For now,” Clockwork said as he took Vlad’s arm again and lent the halfa his support, “you need to rest.”

“But-,” Vlad protested as he was led away to one of the grandest libraries he’d ever seen and settled down on a cushiony couch. “Then why am I-”

“You _are_ here to help,” Clockwork reassured him, sitting down on the couch opposite of him, staff laid across his lap, “I didn’t lie to you about that. But there is nothing to be done at the moment. He has to awaken on his own.”

Vlad leaned back against the cushion, sinking down with a sigh, “Then why did you wake _me_ up? Shouldn’t you have let me wake up on my own as well?”

Clockwork shifted a bit uneasily, silent for a moment, before reluctantly saying, “I was worried.”

“Worried?” Vlad asked, slightly disbelieving.

Clockwork looked to the side, not meeting Vlad’s eye, “I don’t like to see you suffer, Vladimir.”

“Oh,” the breath left him all at once, he wasn’t quite sure what to think of this. Any of this.

“But you’d let _Danny_ continue to suffer?” the Ghostwriter bit out, making his presence in the doorway known, stalking into the room with a coffee cup clutched in his hands like a lifeline. The ghost looked drained and tired and angry, worry and indignation etched into his face in deep lines, under-eye circles, and a sharp frown.

“No,” Clockwork replied shortly, “I don’t like to see him in pain either,” he clenched his fists, “but he _must_ wake up on his own. There’s no other way for him. If he wakes up too soon… He could risk the chance of falling back into a coma, without waking up the second time.”

Both Vlad and the Ghostwriter paled at the prospect. Andrew clung to his coffee even harder and Vlad curled his fingers together in a tight grip, neither one liking the foreboding chill now present.

Vlad sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Why-,” he stopped to collect his thoughts, “Why were you able to bring _me_ around safely, when you can’t do the same for Daniel? Why is there a discrepancy here?”

Andrew moved away from the pair to give them a sense of privacy, back to them as he stared blankly at a shelf of books, and to stay out of the conversation himself, but didn’t move far enough to actually be out of earshot. He was curious as well.

Clockwork shifted his position on the couch and settled in for a long discussion, “You, Vladimir, had your obsession taken away completely when you went into your protective coma and your core is now forever changed, no boundary of obsession to limit it. You are no longer tainted by the warped obsession that had controlled you before. But you are also stable that way, however counterintuitive that may seem.” He stopped to let Vlad absorb the information, the other man looking wide-eyed and paler than before.

“Daniel-,” he looked to the ceiling as he continued, “he only had _part_ of his obsession taken away. His core is now cracked in half.”

All three of them flinched in some manner, knowing how painful _any_ type of damage to a ghost’s core could be so having it split down the middle would be excruciating and _extremely_ dangerous. A ghost’s core was like their heart, after all, and yet so much more. It was the center of their being, the container of their essence. The core was heart and brain and soul all in one. Destroy or damage a ghost’s core and that would either spell their End or make a permanent change.

Having a cracked core couldn’t be healthy, even for a half-ghost.

“How is he _alive?”_ Andrew questioned in a hoarse whisper, one hand rubbing over the center of his chest, where his own core thudded painfully hard.

Clockwork tapped his fingers along his staff absently as he thought, “I assume it has to do with his human half. It’s keeping him in a state of stasis until the wound can heal over. He’ll either have formed a new obsession or not have one at all. I do not know which path he will take.”

“He _will_ wake up though, won’t he?” Andrew pleaded.

Clockwork nodded resolutely, “Yes.”

The room settled into contemplative silence for the most part until a newcomer broke the quiet.

“What’s _he_ doing here?” Jazz questioned with an icy glare towards Vlad, her arms crossed over her chest as she leaned against the doorway.

Vlad flinched away from the glare, not knowing what to do with the hatred directed his way. Once upon a time it wouldn’t have bothered him, he would have simply smirked at the girl and continued on his merry evil way, but now… He didn’t want to be like that. Manipulative and cold. He didn’t want to be hated anymore and now he was free to be who he wanted to be so he didn’t _have_ to be evil or deranged.

The only problem with that was that it left him in turmoil on what he _could_ do now. He didn’t know how to be anything but sly and ambitious and malevolent. He’d never been faced with the need to _good_. He didn’t know _how_. With the influence of Plasmius gone he barely even knew who he was anymore. He curled his fingers tighter in his lap and stared down at them with a severe frown, avoiding looking at Jasmine altogether.

Clockwork turned to her with a look of reprimand, “ _He_ is here to help.”

Jazz narrowed her eyes, but didn’t further challenge the Master of Time when he stood his ground. She shot another glare at Vlad, even if he didn’t raise his head to see it (something that made her pause slightly but quickly ignored), and left the room to check on her brother.

* * *

All Danny could ever remember was floating. Just floating along in the endless, painful, void that he’d found himself in. He didn’t want to remember anything else. He knew there were bad things beyond the void. Bad memories.

It was why he was still in pain. It was the one thing he couldn’t escape, the sharp shard of ice still lodged deep within his chest.

Fragments of thought still drifted over to him, jumbled and mixed up and without any meaning.

_“It wasn’t fair!”_ But he didn’t know what it was.

_“It wasn’t right!”_ What wasn’t right?

He didn’t want to face what, deep down, he knew those fragments meant, what those memories held. He didn’t want to know.

He just wanted to float. And forget.

Wanted to listen only to the deep thrum of something akin to an underwater heartbeat, to feel the rush, like a river, flow over his body and curl around his frozen limbs as he floated in stasis, to see only the starburst darkness he found behind his eyelids.

He didn’t want to remember anything else, know anything else, _be_ anything else.

In his heart, in his _core_ \- the cold and ghostly center that throbbed in pain and felt like it was ripping itself to shreds- deep down he knew he’d have to remember, have to recover, have to find a focus to center himself on again.

But he didn’t want to. Not yet.

So he didn’t.

But then he was shaking, his whole body tumbling about and it was worse than the floating, worse than the memories. He couldn’t tell which way was up or down and everything was still black and he was panicking. Panicking from lack of control, lack of sight. He was running out of _time._

Why couldn’t he be left in _peace?_

_“Wake up. Hurry.”_ It was the whisper. A whisper he had heard before, faintly, in another place. Another dream? It reminded him of train tracks.

“ _You must, you must. Wake up. Hurry._ ”

The turning and tossing was getting worse, he could hear nothing but the whisper, feel nothing but the nauseating twist and turn as the black world tilted on its axis over and over.

_“Hurry._ ”

* * *

Jazz walked into her brother’s room, extremely suspicious of Vlad’s presence in the library lair and intended not to leave Danny’s side just in case. 

Then she noticed the state he was in and all anger vanished in favor of worry and fear as she saw Danny floating above his bed and writhing in pain. His mouth was open in a silent scream as his body flipped and tumbled in place and his glowing limbs twitched and tangled.

“Clockwork!” She called back to the ghosts in a panic. “Ghostwriter!”

She rushed to Danny’s side, hoping that the others heard her call and were coming because she was out of her league here on how to help. She wrung her hands nervously as she watched her little brother float and twist and flinch in pain. Tears sprung to the corner of her eyes, she’d barely dealt with her own parents’ deaths and now Danny…

“This isn’t supposed to be happening yet!” Clockwork hissed as he entered the room, immediately ghosting over to Danny’s side.

 “What’s happening?” Andrew questioned as he stood beside Jazz, still clutching his now-cold coffee cup in a death grip.

“He’s waking up,” Clockwork snapped as he watched Danny writhe, knowing there was nothing he could do. This was not a possibility he had seen coming and he was nowhere near his clocks to be able to see what it would mean for the future.

“But it’s far too early for this!” He growled in frustration. “He won’t be stable!”

Vlad watched silently from the doorway, praying that Daniel would come out of this alright.

* * *

Danny felt like he was spinning like a top, turning too fast to see the world around him or get any bearings on what was happening. His thoughts were just as twisted and were spinning just as fast as the rapid merry-go-round he found himself twirling on. Everything was rushed and and going far too fast. Noises and sudden bursts of color blending and disappearing just as quickly.

“ _Hurry._ ” A single whisper broke through the tornado.

Then, with a snap, he woke up.

 


	20. A Distraction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> after 30000000 years i finally update. amazing. but finals were a bitch so. also id like to remind u that up to this point i actually had very little plotted out bUT NOW!! IM ON BREAK!!! AND I HAVE ALL THE DETAILS PLOTTED!!!!! HAHAAAA

> _"Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break." - William Shakespeare, Macbeth_

* * *

 

Valerie Gray hovered over Amity Park in her red and black suit, pressing a hand against her ear to activate the comm link she’d established with Sam and Tucker earlier when the first few houses had started going down. She cursed when she got only static from the receiver, going on the slim hope that it was the result of distance instead of trouble. From this position she could only watch and wait. The police and the fire department had evacuation and damage control handled without her. No, her job, and Sam and Tucker’s job, was to bring down the ghost that was ransacking the town in the first place. There hadn’t been any more casualties so far and they planned to keep it that way. Or hoped to at least.

They couldn’t do as much without Danny. But they didn’t know where he was. They’d just have to run on a miracle and hope he showed up eventually.

Valerie, in full Red Huntress regalia, could only watch and wait.

The ghost that started it all had seemingly vanished, the remaining houses left undisturbed. But they knew better. The ghost had gone wild when it escaped the portal, screaming and raging and cackling as it destroyed and crushed and ransacked. Now it was quiet, but the atmosphere was still the same, filled with fear and an icy tenseness that always came with a ghost nearby. It hadn’t left yet.

They were hoping it’d end like a game of whack-a-mole. The ghost pops up, Valerie gives it a whack, and then Sam or Tucker sucks it into a thermos, whoever’s closest. She’d long since become part of Team Phantom (especially after Danny’d come clean and fessed up about being both Fenton _and_ Phantom, it’d been a shock but she’d gotten over it and they formed a truce) and they usually worked well together now-a-days, taking down small fry without even Danny’s help. But this ghost was a nasty one, too, so they didn’t expect much without him as a powerhouse.

All they could do was watch and wait.

And hope everyone made it out alive.

* * *

 

Jazz was worried. Incredibly, undeniably, outrageously worried. She might also still be in shock. Or maybe she’d already dropped down to numb. She didn’t know. She kept reciting the five stages of grief over and over in her head. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Denial- Oh, who was she trying to kid? She couldn’t fix this by using some vague pop-psychology mantra as a poor excuse of a coping mechanism. Her parents were dead. Gone. Danny was… Danny was hurt as far as she could comprehend. She didn’t understand ghost biology. She didn’t understand what was wrong with her baby brother. She didn’t understand anything that was happening anymore.

Here she was, waiting outside Danny’s room, wringing her hands and letting her brain spiral out of control with worry and grief, waiting, waiting so very long, for a verdict on how her brother was doing. And to put the icing on the lovely everything-in-my-life-suddenly-went-very-very-wrong cake she was waiting with a near stranger (who she was told was Danny’s friend but he’d previously been an enemy and Danny hadn’t mentioned _anything_ about this) and _Vlad_ (evil fruitloop and her brother’s _worst enemy)_ of all people. She might just skewer Clockwork once he came out and told them all how Danny was. She didn’t know how but she was going to find a way.

In the meantime, she might actually be panicking. Worrying. Grieving. Hyperventilating. There was. A lot. Going on all at once andmaybeshewasn’tprocessingitall…

“Jasmine,” Vlad’s voice cut through her panic like ice, jarring and unpleasant. But at least it cut through. “Breathe, dear.”

She focused on her breathing, in and out. Slowly. She focused on not shaking. Lacing her fingers together and squeezing, bringing her unsteady hands up to her lips in some sort of half-baked prayer. She closed her eyes and breathed in. And out. She steadied herself. Thankfully she hadn’t gone into a full blown panic attack, but she might have if she hadn’t stopped the spiral. If Vlad hadn’t stopped the spiral. She opened her eyes only to narrow them at Vlad, glaring at him as she looked him over.

He looked like hell. It was the most delicate way to put it. There were bags under his eyes, his hair was a tangled flyaway mess, his clothes were slightly ripped and charred and generally ruffled, he looked very, very pale, and over all… He looked tired. Sad. Hurt. For once he didn’t have a shred of arrogance holding him up, no superior attitude to hide behind, the holier-than-thou look he usually boasted was completely gone. His eyes were sad. His posture, hurt. He even looked tired in his bones.

She looked away. She didn’t want to face this right now. She didn’t want to think about Vlad being vulnerable and hurt. It was far too different from the norm. What she needed was consistency right now and hating Vlad was part of the usual routine. She decided to turn to the Ghostwriter instead. He was new but at least it wasn’t as fundamental of a change. She also wanted the story behind him and Danny, because obviously there was something a bit deeper than a new friendship with how worried the ghost looked.

Clockwork had been in that room for a while now and he didn’t look to be emerging any time soon, so they might as well distract themselves with awkward conversation. That and she was a nosey big sister that was curious about her brother’s life since she left for the semester. Especially since she hadn’t been updated about his newest friend.

“You seem very worried about my little brother, Ghostwriter,” she started casually, hoping to shake him from his nervous stupor just enough to get his attention but not enough to startle him.

He seemed startled anyway, shoulders bunching in the slightest of jumps and hands clenching tighter around his ever-present cup of coffee. His eyes slid to her before going back to their vigilant watch of Danny’s door. “Yes,” he said quietly before taking a small sip of his coffee, eyes still avoiding hers.

“Can I ask about how you and Danny became friends?” she asked carefully, letting her anxiety take a backseat in favor of her curiosity and minimal psych training, “He hasn’t filled me in lately.”

Ghostwriter made a strangled noise in the back of his throat, suitably distracted from worrying about Danny in favor of worrying about how to talk to his sister and tell her about their relationship. He was not very good with people. Not. At. All.

“He apologized for ruining my book,” Andrew started softly, deciding to just go from the beginning. “Then we talked and-,” he shrugged, “now we’re… friends.”

Vlad watched the two of them talk with a wan smile, he was just as curious as Jasmine seemed to be at the sudden closeness between the Ghostwriter and Daniel, but he sat back and let Jasmine do all the interrogating. It was amusing and he knew it let Jasmine distract herself from the situation a bit. He frowned as a wave of lightly aching pain overcame him and he looked to the silent dark wood of the door. He sighed, ignored be the other two in the hall, and leaned against the wall just beside it, leaning his head back and closing his tired eyes. He only hoped Clockwork knew what he was doing.

“Friends?” Jazz questioned, narrowing her eyes and shifting to stand closer to Ghostwriter. She’d caught that little hesitation before friends and it made her all the more curious and nosey. “Are you more than that?”

Andrew was back to resolutely looking at the door and trying to hide the dusting of a blush on his cheeks with his coffee cup. He didn’t see the use in lying to Jasmine but he still felt somewhat embarrassed about the whole situation, maybe because the relationship was so new? Because he’d never had one before? Whatever the case he wanted that door to open _right now_ and save him from talking any further. After a small stretch of silence that felt even _worse_ somehow, he finally answered her. “Yes.”

“Yes?!” Jazz pulled away, slightly shocked, she’d suspected something with the hesitation but? She didn’t really know what to think. And why hadn’t Danny called her the moment there was this sort of development in his life?! She was kind of hurt, but the need for details soon overtook that.

 “Are you boyfriends, then?” She asked quickly, maneuvering around Ghostwriter to stand directly in front of him and catch his eye. He hid behind his coffee cup even further and glanced away. “When did this happen? How? Are you treating him right?” She narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms, “You better be treating him right or you’ll be talking to the wrong end of the Fenton Bazooka, so help me.”

Andrew choked on his coffee. “I- um- yes?”

Jazz gave him a searching look before giving in with a pleasant grin, “So what do you like about my brother? And you never told me how you two got together.”

Andrew’s mind drew a blank, not knowing how to deal with… this. Any bit of it. He just wanted to see Danny alright again and have things go back to mostly normal. Ghosts didn’t manage well with change.

“I-,” he said, only to be cut off by the door opening wide and a tired looking Clockwork floating out and gently closing the door behind him. Everyone’s attention immediately snapped to the older ghost. Saved by the alarm clock.

Jazz felt like all her anxiety and fear came crashing back down on her head at the sight of him. “How’s he doing?” she asked softly, hurriedly, “Is he okay? Will Danny be alright?”

Clockwork held up a slightly shaking hand, “As far as I know, he will be fine. He’s resting right now.”

“ _Resting?_ ” Andrew hissed with a glare, “He was just in a coma! Should he be sleeping more so soon?”

“Sleeping would be _best_ for him,” Clockwork snapped before rubbing a hand over his face and leaning back against the wall. “But no he is _not_ sleeping, he is simply processing everything so the healing can take its course.”

“Can we see him?” Jazz asked with a small voice, hands clutched together in front of her face.

Clockwork sighed, “One at a time, yes.”

Andrew, for however much he wanted to rush into the room, nudged Jasmine towards the door first, knowing that Danny would need what was left of his family more than him just yet. “Go on.”

Jazz nodded and opened the door with a shaky hand before slipping inside and closing it behind her. The most anyone saw was a faint purple glow lighting up the room before the dark brown closed them off again.

Clockwork moved away from the door with heavy footsteps, his tail having turned to legs to keep him upright after expending so much power to keep Danny stabilized. He hoped it would be enough. He’d had to wrap his own power-charged ectoplasm directly around Daniel’s core in order to seal up the crack. The tricky part had been getting Daniel’s core to the surface so he could do so and then making sure the Daniel’s core wouldn’t outright reject the foreign ectoplasm and make him worse; much like how humans had to make sure organs were compatible enough for a transplant and yet different entirely.

Ectoplasm was strangely sentient in a way, just barely enough to know what will harm and what will help its host. It takes on the personality of the ghost that generates it, in a way. It was like having semi-sentient anti-bodies to protect you and that could be used for nearly anything you could think of. Daniel’s core had recognized that Clockwork’s makeshift ectoplasm bandage had meant no harm and thankfully, latched onto the energy in its own strange way, allowing it to gently wrap around the crack that nearly severed it in half. From here on, time would only tell if it would be enough to help Danny heal.

Clockwork leaned heavily on his staff as he began to make his way to the main room with cushiony couches, having infused as much of his energy into his ectoplasm as possible to help Danny he needed rest to recoup.

Vlad, being the closest to Clockwork and wanting to help the man that had been so kind to him, took one of his arms and some of his weight as he walked with the Time Master, just as Clockwork had done for him previously. He knew it wouldn’t be best to see Daniel right away, anyway, not with how fragile the both of them were, so he decided to wait it out with the older ghost and make sure he was alright. Jasmine and Ghostwriter could take care of Daniel just fine without him. Clockwork was also a conundrum of a ghost that Vlad felt inclined to figure out.

“Get me _immediately_ should anything go wrong,” Clockwork told Ghostwriter sharply as he left, leaning on Vlad all the way. A nap sounded delightful to him right then.

Andrew only nodded as the two walked away, knuckles still completely white where they wrapped around his cold coffee mug. Vidya let out a few soft notes of concern but he only grumbled at her, “Where were you when Jasmine was interrogating me, you traitor.”

Vidya’s bubbly trill of a laugh made him smile slightly, but it didn’t make the tenseness in his shoulders disappear. There was just… so much happening all at once. So much that was astoundingly new, so much that had been good, so much that was now bad but only in the way that it had him worried… and so much that he didn’t know how to handle.

He’d existed for quite some time now, both as a human and a ghost, but he’d never actually been in a relationship before. This was new, in every single way. He’d only just started getting to know Danny and he’d been a mite infatuated, but this… Seeing him so hurt… It hurt him in return. It turned him into a ball of worry and confusion and doubt and sadness and a whole host of other emotions that he couldn’t name but were sitting in the pit of his unused stomach like a block of spiked ice. Cold and hard and twisting his insides.

The worst of it was the worry and the doubt. He cared for Danny, not just as a crush but as a friend as well. He was concerned. He wanted Danny to be okay. But he didn’t know if the halfa _would_ be okay. There was so much uncertainty around everything and Danny was still _hurt_. Then there was the doubt. The crushing, confusing, doubt. Hadn’t they just become boyfriends recently? What was he supposed to do? Was it too much to want to be by Danny’s side? To hold his hand and tell him everything would be fine? Did Danny even _want_ him there? They’d only just admitted they _liked_ each other and now… Andrew might lose him… one way or another…

Vidya’s agitato trill suddenly caught Andrew’s attention. Something was wrong.

“Vidya?” he questioned as he set his coffee mug to float away from him and towards the nearest flat surface. He might need his hands free for this.

Vidya sounded a few more anxious notes and brought up a hologram of the front door and several restless ghosts waiting outside behind it. He recognized a few like Youngblood and Kitty and Dora. He frowned. What in the world could they want? He waved a hand through the projection to make it disappear before striding off towards the door. This didn’t bode well.

* * *

“Jazz,” Danny rasped out when he saw his sister enter the room, “hey.”

“Oh, little brother,” Jazz said through tears that immediately started flowing at the sight of Danny laying in his bed looking defeated and broken. She rushed to his side and latched onto him for the hug of a lifetime, wanting desperately to comfort the pain away. She didn’t want to see him like this ever again.

Danny wrapped his arms around Jazz and let her soft warmth surround him. She was the last family he had left. _Jesus Christ_ , he thought, fingers clutching at the fuzzy black material of Jazz’s sweater, _she’s the only family I have left_. Danny started crying too, silently but strongly, body convulsing slightly with the force of his sobs. Jazz only clung to him tighter.

The Fentons grieved together.

“Jazz,” he said again, his voice cracking and his jaw trembling, “Th-They’re g-gone.”

“I know, Danny, I know,” she whispered back, just as brokenly and her own voice thick with tears.

They sat there for a long moment, illuminated only by the soft purple glow of the ectoplasm bandage from Clockwork wrapped tightly around Danny’s chest, rocking each other and clinging to each other like the world would end at any second. For them it felt like it already had.

“Okay,” Jazz said quietly as she wiped away the tear tracks on her face with one sleeve of her sweater, her other arm still wrapped around her brother. She leaned back a bit and wiped away the tears on Danny’s face as well, gently and with shaky care. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Danny asked.

“Yeah,” Jazz said, “We- We can’t wallow in here forever now can we?”

She sounded uncertain, like she was trying to put up a front, trying to do what she thought was best, healthiest, when she felt like she _could_ sit here and wallow with her brother forever. She didn’t want to face the world but she knew that going over what they lost for endless moments wouldn’t be healthy in the long run. They could go back to grieving as they needed it, but they couldn’t get rid of it all in one long session. It was back to distraction time and dealing with things not related to… what happened.

“I guess not…?” Danny questioned as he leaned back into the pillows on his bed, moving out of Jazz’s hug but making sure to grab her hand to keep contact, subconsciously refusing to let her go in case she disappeared too.

“Mmhm,” Jazz hummed as she squeezed her brother’s hand, “You have to tell me how you and Ghostwriter got together anyway.”

Danny sputtered, effectively distracted for the moment from the dull throb of pain in his chest, even if it was still there, in the background. He blushed just the slightest. “I- uh,” he rubbed at the back of his head, “I just kinda confessed and then he confessed and then we decided to date and stuff, I dunno.”

Jazz raised her eyebrow and gave her brother a look, “And there isn’t any more to it? I know you’re not brave enough to just confess to somebody on your own.”

“Hey!” Danny whined, “I am too!”

Jazz snorted, “Not after the incident with Paulina you aren’t.”

Danny grumbled, “Yeah, yeah, whatever, I resent that.”

“So?” Jazz leaned forward with a knowing look. “You also need to fill me in on just _how_ you went from enemies to boyfriends. Last time we talked he was still on the ‘try not to piss off’ list.”

“Oh yeah, I guess I hadn’t called you about that, huh?” Danny nervously played with the sheet of his bed, feeling just a bit guilty about not updating his sister on important things in his life like that. “Well, first of all, I _did_ just confess to Andrew. It just took Sam and Tucker blackmailing me.”

Jazz huffed a laugh, “I suppose that would do it. And I’m going to guess that Andrew is Ghostwriter?”

Danny nodded, “Yeah. I started to like him after we started hanging out for a while. Clockwork asked me to pick up a book for him and I apologized and then I- I got into a fight with mom and d-dad…” he broke off there, taking a deep breath and trying to calm down. He didn’t need to sit there and sob like a baby at just the _thought_ of them. He wasn’t that weak, dammit! Jazz wrapped her arms around him again and held him close.

“I-I ran off,” he said into her shoulder, “I went to Andrew. And I kinda ranted and started- started _crying_ in front of him. And he was nice. He said nice things and calmed me down. So, I visited more and we hung out.”

Jazz held him for a bit more until he dropped his arms away. She pulled back then and gave him a soft little smile, “Well he seems nice, I guess. I’m happy you have him, little bro.”

“Thanks, Jazz,” he said and smiled back, just as softly and just as sadly.

Jazz looked about to say something else before she was interrupted by a sharp knock on the door.

“Danny,” they heard Andrew call through the door, “Jasmine? We have a bit of a problem.”


	21. A Fight

> _"Where there is unity there is always victory." - Publilius Syrus_

Jazz was the first to move, immediately going to the door and letting Andrew in, wondering and worrying about what in the world could be wrong _now._ Hadn’t everything already fallen down around her ears? The only thing else that could go wrong in her life was sitting on the bed in this room. Danny still seemed mildly safe, so what happened? Surely it couldn’t be anything worse?

“The ghost,” Andrew started to explain, but his words came out a bit rushed and jumbled, “the ghost that attacked— that’s been attacking— it’s still on the loose.”

_Maybe it could be worse_ , Jazz thought as her face went white and she thought about the ravaged wreck the town might have turned into because of the berserk ghost. She hadn’t seen the destruction of her house with her own eyes, but she could imagine. And she could imagine the carnage of all the other houses in Amity. All the other families.

Danny didn’t look like he was taking the news well either. He was even paler than before and clutching the sheets of his bed in a death grip.

“ _What?_ ” he choked out.

“There are ghosts out front.” Andrew replied, his speech slowing to a more reasonable speed. “Allies of yours,” he gave a small, quick smile, “they’ve come to give you their condolences and— to give you warning. They wish to aid you in this fight.”

Then Andrew narrowed his eyes, “Not that you are in _any_ condition to fight.”

Danny tensed and instantly went on the defensive, his hero complex kicking in, “But-,” he protested.

“But _nothing_ ,” Jazz interjected, “You are going to _lay here_ and you are going to _get better_. Sam and Tucker and Valerie probably already have it handled. If not then the ghosts wanting to help will make sure it is. _You_ ,” she pointed a rigid finger at Danny, “will stay. Period.”

Danny glared at his sister but didn’t say a word. He knew it was no use fighting back against his sister when she was being stubborn like this. She only got like this when the topic was something she was passionate about… or it was for his own safety. He glared down at the sheets. She was right too. He _did_ feel weak and trembley and kind of empty. But that only made him feel worse. It was _his_ responsibility to take care of Amity Park. _He_ was the one that was supposed to protect it and everyone inside. How could he do his job, how could he save everyone, if he was so weak and _useless_ like this? He could feel the cracks in his core split just the slightest bit further, more hairline fractures skittering across the surface. It hurt. It hurt so bad.

“Danny,” Jazz’s voice was softer now and she spoke and leaned closer to him, “I know what you’re thinking, little brother. I know you too well and I can tell you that it’s going to be _fine_.” She put a reassuring hand on his shoulder and gathered her thoughts, speaking carefully as she went. “You are hurt. Right now. But you’ll get better. I promise. _Then_ you can go back to doing what you do best.”

He looked up in time to see her give him a warm smile as she said, “Being a hero.”

The fissures stopped but they didn’t recede either. He was still a little more broken by his thoughts, but at least they weren’t getting worse. Jazz still thought of him as a hero, even in this useless state, even though he was _broken_ now. And while he still felt bad (horrible and empty) at least that was something.

“ _But_ ,” she continued sternly, “you have to get better first. Which means staying in bed and _resting_. I’m sure Andrew wouldn’t mind looking after you and making sure that you are. Right?”

Andrew nodded when she looked over at him, “Of course.”

“In the meantime, I’m going to go corral your allies and work on taking out this ghost myself,” Jazz said, looking determined.

A sharp spike of fear pierced Danny’s stomach at the thought. “But Jazz!”

She would die! She couldn’t go! She couldn’t leave! She couldn’t just _abandon_ him! _She wouldn’t come back alive!_

“I have to go,” she told him, clasping her hands over his shoulders to try and ground him, “I’m going to go and monitor the situation and get everything organized. You know how some of those ghosts can be,” she smirked, “completely hopeless most of the time, right?”

She waited until he gave a reluctant nod, then she looked him in the eyes and reassured him, “I will not be in the line of fire. I promise. But I have to go. I need my own way to cope, you know. Besides,” she stood up cheerily, “my aim is much better with the Fenton bazooka so no one would _dare_ to mess with me!”

Danny snorted, “Yeah, okay.”

She glared and gave an indignant sniff but grinned internally knowing she’d successfully distracted her brother. It might not work for long, but it would do for now. Then she noticed that the grip Danny had on his sheets was growing tighter and his hands were trembling just slightly. She frowned. She didn’t know what else to do. Not with her own devastation and anxiety lurking in the back of her mind, waiting for a moment she wasn’t distracting herself.

“I will escort your sister, Daniel,” Clockwork’s haggard voice offered from the doorway. He looked tired still, as much as any ghost could really, but at least he was standing on his own now and seemed to fine for the most part.

“But-,” Danny still wanted to protest, even if he knew it would be futile. He still wanted to go out and fight this monster _himself_. He didn’t want to risk his sister, not when it should be _his_ job to fight and _her_ job to just be _safe_.

“Not all things can be predicted,” Clockwork said heavily, with a strained smile, “but I _can_ say that Jasmine will be alright. I will escort her to Amity and I am sure all of your friends outside will be happy to take care of the monster still lurking.”

“How?” Danny asked, scrambling to find a reason to make everyone _stay_ while _he_ took care of the ghost, no matter how weak he was he couldn’t risk them and he couldn’t risk being _useless,_ “Wasn’t the portal destroyed with- with our house?”

Clockwork nodded, “It was, but I believe your friend Wulf is among the guests waiting for us outside.”

“Jes! Saluton, mia amiko!” a rumbling voice called out behind Clockwork before the hulking form of Wulf made itself known past the doorway, Clockwork moved aside to let him in, along with a few of the other ghosts that had tagged along, “Ĉu vi fartas bone?”

“Wulf?” Danny asked, ignoring Wulf’s own question about his wellbeing, he didn’t know how to answer, “What are you doing here?”

“Ni venis por helpi vin,” he replied simply, he and the others had come to help Danny, both with seeing if he was stable and wishing him well, as well as helping him finally get rid of the “Lair Destroyer”.

“I’m fine,” Danny said shortly, “I can do this on my own. I’ll be fine in a minute just let me—”

“Ne,” Wulf cut him off, crossing his arms, “Vi doloras. Ripozo. Ni komprenas.”

“You need to take it easy, babypop,” Ember cut in with a hand on her hip, “We came here to give our condolences, kid, not make you fight when you’re down.”

“I know you like playing hero, Phantom,” Youngblood joined in, “But even superheroes have their breaking point.”

“I’m not—,” Danny started with eyebrows furrowed.

“Stop tryna be a martyr, kid,” Ember interrupted him, then she cocked her hip and gave a confident smile, “Besides, you’re not the only one with power here. We can take this guy.”

“Sir Danny,” Dorathea made her way to the front of the crowd, “you have nothing to worry about. We shall handle the monster. We only came here to gather more allies and wish you well, not to force you to fight with us. There will be other battles for you, Sir Danny, for you are truly a brave knight. But you must rest now.”

“C’mon, kid,” Johnny 13 said from the wall he was leaning against, “Things’ll be a lot less fun if you hurt yourself fighting when you don’t need to. We can take care of this.”

“Ripozo,” Wulf repeated firmly, “Vivi por batali alian tagon.”

Danny frowned, still not letting go of his thoughts of needing to _protect_ everyone and not the other way around, but he leaned back in bed in any case. He couldn’t fight them on this. He couldn’t fight anyone with the way he was at present and he _hated_ it. The bit of obsession still attached to his core _demanded_ that he go out and fight. It compelled him and twisted his thoughts even if he knew, logically, that he’d be no use in a fight. He fought the feeling and tried to stop the cracks in his core before he was able to latch onto what Wulf told him, _viv por Batali alian tagon_. Live to fight another day.

He would stay here. And he would heal. And the others would be perfectly capable of taking care of the monster. That would have to be that.

He nodded to them all and looked away to the wall, watching the purple glow of Clockwork’s ectoplasm bandages cast shadows on the dark blue paint. If he looked at them he might go through another round of desperation to protect them all and he didn’t need that.

“Go,” he said quietly, “hurry.”

The room shuffled about as everyone left, the ghosts casting him pitying glances that he didn’t see before they slipped through the door. Clockwork gave him a weary look, tired and dearly wishing this would all resolve itself soon (even though he knew it wouldn’t), before he left to wait outside the door for Jasmine. Jazz kissed his cheek and held back tears before steeling herself and putting on a determined mask of stone; she was ready to face anything. Andrew held his hand and stayed by his side, not saying anything.

The room emptied out and Danny wanted to curl up into a ball and block out the world. He wouldn’t feel better until everyone was back and accounted for and _safe_. He wanted to see Tucker and Sam and Valerie. He wanted Jazz to come back. He wanted Clockwork to come back. He wanted to make sure Wulf and Dora and Youngblood and Ember and Johnny could all handle themselves and would still _be there_ when the fight was over.

He’d already lost his parents. He didn’t want to lose _anyone else_.

He clutched Andrew’s hand like it was the only thing in the universe. Andrew didn’t mind.

* * *

Wulf tore a hole through the Ghost Zone and lead everyone out to the other side in Amity Park, landing on some rooftop that was still standing. Smoke and rubble greeted them all and they winced. Amity had become their home just as much as the Ghost Zone as of late.

None of them would stand for this. The Lair Destroyer was going _down_.

“Hey!” the Red Huntress had spotted them and zoomed over, ecto-gun at the ready before she spotted Jazz among the ghosts. She lifted her helmet to talk, “What are you all doing here?”

“They’re reinforcements,” Jazz replied shortly, “What’s the situation here?”

Valerie narrowed her eyes at Jazz but answered her anyway, “Sam and Tuck were on ground patrol but they haven’t answered their communicators. There’s too much static. Everyone was evacuated in time so there weren’t any more casualties. The ghost is hiding but we can tell it’s still here. That’s it so far.”

Jazz nodded, relieved that no one else was hurt (she pushed down the irrational anger at being the _only_ one to have lost someone, she knew it wouldn’t help at the moment) before turning to her small army. There were so many.

She turned to Valerie, “Have any more Fenton Phones on hand?”

Valerie nodded and pulled extra pairs from her backpack, “I’m like a girl scout. Always prepared.”

“Thanks.” Jazz handed them out to each ghost while telling them where to go. “Ember and Skulker take the north. Youngblood and Desiree the South. Wulf and Technus take the East. Dorathea and Sidney take the West. Box Ghost and Lunch Lady I want you in the center. Amorpho take Cujo and patrol the outskirts. Keep in contact. Protect any citizens still out and tell us the _moment_ something starts happening.”

No one said a word, just nodded and flew off. They all knew how serious this was. The Lair Destroyer had effected them all and they wanted them _gone_ before they could do more damage.

“Johnny,” Jazz said as she threw an earpiece towards him, “I want you and Kitty to take your bike and see if you can find out where Tucker and Sam went.”

He gave her a salute, “Yes, ma’am,” and revved his motorcycle before riding off.

Jazz put the last communicator in her ear, “Valerie, can you take to the skies again to keep a look out?”

Valerie nodded and zipped away, scanning the sky as she went.

Now they played the waiting game.

Jazz turned to Clockwork who was leaning tiredly against the ledge of the roof and watching the dusky horizon.

“What happened to Vlad?” she asked icily, still angry at Vlad’s presence in Andrew’s home.

Clockwork frowned, “He is asleep on the couch. He needs the rest.”

Jazz scoffed, “Why do you trust him?”

Clockwork was silent, shoulders turning stiff before he finally answered, “He has the capability of change now.”

Jazz raised an eyebrow, “Now?”

Clockwork nodded but didn’t bother to elaborate. There were many reasons behind everything he did. Some better than others, some chosen by logic and others by emotion. He wasn’t always proud of his decisions but he felt he made them for the best.

Tension spiked in the air, the atmosphere turning electric and charged just like it did before a lighting strike. Suddenly the building started to shake, deep trembles that shifted the concrete beneath their feet without warning, tilting the building as they pulsed.

“Jasmine!” Clockwork shouted before hurriedly freezing time. He raced over to Jazz and lifted up her frozen form. He didn’t have any medallions on him and with his power weakened from healing Danny he didn’t have much time before the world restarted. He flew off the roof with Jazz, settling her on the sidewalk across the street, and unfreezing time before his energy was completely sapped.

Jazz gasped as she regained her bearings when the world stopped rapidly shifting. Being moved from one place to another with no span of time in between was strange and disorienting. She grabbed Clockwork’s cloak as she steadied herself before snapping into action, years of ghost fighting having sharpened her reflexes.

Her hand flew up to her ear, “Everyone back to start! The Lair Destroyer has finally appeared! We need back up, _NOW!_ ”

They watched the building crumble.

One ectoblast after another appeared from every direction as their reinforcements appeared. Ember’s guitar made the monster screech. Youngblood and Technus’s shots kept it cornered. Skulker’s traps made sure it couldn’t leave. Desiree and Wulf lifted away the rubble so they could get to the monster better. Dorathea transformed and rained down fire from above with Pointdexter riding on her shoulders and shooting blasts to help. The Box Ghost and Lunch Lady circled around it and added hits where needed. Amorpho and Cujo stood guard in front of Jazz and Clockwork, then guarded Sam and Tucker when they arrived as well (they looked tired and worn but otherwise unhurt). Johnny and his shadow tackled the monster directly while Kitty joined Ember to amplify her attacks. Valerie called out and coordinated movements from above.

It was a wild, free-for all frenzy of searing hot green. Everything was happening at once and it all packed a _punch_. The heat in the air was near unbearable so close to the fight with the amount of super-charged ectoplasm flying around and the darkening sky was lit up like a neon sign with glow of it all.

The ghost never stood a chance against them all.

It screeched and screamed and writhed and wailed. It grew smaller and smaller as its power waned. Shot after shot made its mark until the shadowy creature was riddled with steaming green-rimmed holes. It grew louder and angrier with each hit before it suddenly vanished with a pitiful yet ear-splitting scream.

It was gone.

Completely and totally.

Youngblood started the cheer.

Everyone picked it up with relief and adrenaline infused enthusiasm. It was gone! They Ended the Lair Destroyer! Everyone was safe!

Jazz sagged with relief, mingled with a bone-deep sort of sadness, and leaned against the building behind her. It was over. But was it really? She had… parents to… mourn. So many people had lost their homes. Everything would need to be rebuilt. Danny was still injured. Things would never be the same for them, it would never go “back to normal” for her.

“Jazz!” Sam called to her, shaking her from her spiral, “Jazz do you know where Danny is?!”

Tucker came rushing up behind her, repeating the question in a jumbled rush.

Jazz just nodded, “He’s… safe,” she told them.

“Safe? Where? What happened? Is he okay? Are _you_ okay? What’s been going on?”

Clockwork stepped up and caught their attention when Jazz seemed to get lost in their questions.

“Daniel was hurt,” he waited for their gasps before continuing, “but he _will_ be fine. He is resting at Ghostwriter’s lair.”

Both of them seemed let out a sigh in relief. Their friend was safe and he was okay. That’s what they needed to know the most.

“Can we see him?” Tucker asked.

“Yes,” Clockwork answered, “It would be for the best that he sees you. I will find Wulf and Valerie and then we will leave.”

After he left, still heavily leaning against his staff as he walked, Sam and Tucker took up guard on either side of Jazz, giving her silent support. They’d seen the state of FentonWorks and with Danny’s parents being AWOL during this whole fight they could only assume the worst.

Clockwork came back with Wulf and Valerie in tow and they left without another word.

* * *

Danny was still steadily watching the wall and letting his thoughts run wild wherever they pleased. It helped calm him down somehow, even if it was only a little bit as his muscles were still wound up tight and the cracks in his core still pained him with every breath.

Andrew had summoned a book an indeterminate length ago and was quietly reading with one hand and the other still curled around Danny’s. It was nice. Danny liked the weight of it and it helped ground him. The occasional hum of interest and crackle of a page turn also kept him rooted in reality. That was also nice. Andrew was nice.

Then with a burst of noise from the door he was being tackled (carefully) to the bed by his best friends.

He laughed in relief and hugged them back fiercely.

He looked over to see Jazz in the doorway, safe and sound.

Everyone was okay.

Everything would be alright.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my friends this is far from over :)


	22. A Lesson

> _"Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your own thoughts, unguarded." – Buddha_

Danny knew he should be happy, at least a little bit, his friends and what was left of his family had been around him and visiting in and out all week, going back and forth between him and rebuilding Amity Park. The enemy was gone. He had healed to the point he could roam around the library. There should be some sort of comfort here, a bit of happiness at the least.

But all he could feel was intense, searing, frustration.

He still felt weak and helpless. He felt empty with the loss of his parents. He felt completely paranoid, thinking there was a threat around every corner and he had the lingering feeling that “The Lair Destroyer” would be making a comeback eventually.

He hated feeling this way, which made it even worse.

He was a complex well of twisted emotions all rolling around and putrefying deep within his chest. The thought of which _also_ made everything worse because he knew his core was still cracked and he was afraid these horrible negative emotions would somehow seep into it and change him.

He talked with Jazz about some of it sometimes but he didn’t want to worry her or overwhelm her, so he held back a lot of it when she had the time to sit down and talk it all out. She helped him with the pricklier things but he wouldn’t dare let her reach down to the thick of it. He talked with Andrew, but he didn’t want to bog down his new boyfriend (and wow that word still somehow managed to make him giddy, even if just a little bit) with heavy emotional baggage, so he talked about silly things and small personal things, not the big, deep down scary things. He talked with Sam and Tucker and Valerie, but he didn’t want to worry them either, didn’t want to alienate his only friends, so he joked and he laughed and he genuinely had a good time if only for a little bit. He talked with Clockwork, he yelled and he accused and he apologized all in one breath, he cried and he was comforted if only briefly, but even that all wasn’t enough to untangle everything.

Mostly, he took time to brood by himself, in quiet company sometimes with Andrew (who took to reading or writing silently beside him, but he was still there and with him, which counted) and sometimes with Jazz (who did her homework and kept sentinel over him) and sometimes with his friends (also with homework and reading and anything else that kept them entertained but quiet) and he would pick apart his feelings himself.

He was currently lounging in the grand room of the library, resting on one of the many squishy pillows with Jazz and Andrew by his side, reading and studying respectively. Vidya was humming to herself, which translated to a light and slow violin solo that sounded like a lullaby more than anything else. It went well with the soft sunlight that lit up the oak walls and shelves.

Danny couldn’t find it in himself to enjoy it. Not really. Not when he was picking apart his grief.

He missed his parents. Of course he did. They were his parents. He loved them. They loved him. That was simple. He was angry. At them, at the world, at the Lair Destroyer, at Clockwork, at himself. That was fair. Jazz had told him, on multiple occasions, that anger was part of grieving. Why was he angry?

He was angry at his parents because they were gone, because he didn’t have more time with them, because they weren’t always the _best_ parents, and because he didn’t get to say good-bye. Not all of those were very valid reasons to be angry but they were there none-the-less. He couldn’t do much about them, not yet anyway, not when everything was so raw. He was angry at the world for putting him in this situation (his powers, the ghosts, the loss, everything), for taking so much away from him, for all the circumstances. There _really_ wasn’t much he could do about that. He was angry at the Lair Destroyer for ruining everything, for hurting him, for hurting the town, for taking his parents away. That _seemed_ healthier at least, it was an enemy to focus on and he could vent about it when they tracked the ghost down and he could blast it to smithereens. He was angry at Clockwork for not seeing any of this coming, for lying, for not stopping it when he could. That anger was dull at least, and it was something he was working on with the Master of Time, talking it out and hearing his reasons, learning to forgive him. He was angry at himself for reasons he couldn’t quite pinpoint. Blame was something he’d figured out and weakness. And other things more nebulous and innate.

He was relieved, in some deep dark part of himself, and that also made him sick to think about. But he had to reason it out, he had to pick it apart so he could understand and get better. That’s what he told himself, and what Jazz told him too. He was relieved because their death meant that he never had to tell them. He never had to fear their reactions about him being part ghost. About him being bisexual. About him having a ghost for a boyfriend. About nearly every important part of his life. He felt relief because they were dead, and because they were dead their reactions didn’t matter anymore. It made him want to throw up. How could he feel any sort of relief about his parent’s death?! _They were dead!_ He should be sad! And nothing else! Definitely not _relieved!_

But he felt that way all the same.

He did a head count of his emotions; he was angry, he was sad, he was… relieved, he was guilty, he was frustrated, he was afraid, he was worried, he was weak, he was curious and he was, overall, conflicted about everything. Too many, too much.

He wanted to pace, he wanted to tear his hair out, he wanted to scream, and he wanted to cry.

He didn’t know what to do with all these feelings and most of all he just wanted to bury them deep down and concentrate on anything else. But there just wasn’t anything else to think about.

So he rolled them about in his head and tried to think of a way of resolving them without getting anyone else involved. It wasn’t really working out that well.

So he thought about Amity Park, how it was being rebuilt, wondering how many people had lost their homes. How long it was taking for the town to come back together. How it was his fault it fell apart in the first place.

He thought about Vlad. The last time he’d seen the man he’d been going berserk. He hadn’t seen him since, though he’d been told by Jazz that he was somewhere nearby. She said she didn’t trust him but at the very least he looked and acted different. Clockwork said he’d changed. Danny didn’t know what to think.

He thought about how weak he felt. How helpless. He wanted to get better. Immediately. But rest was the only answer, which only made him feel more helpless, like he wasn’t doing enough to fight. To protect. To rebuild. It only made him restless and anxious.

He groaned and buried his head between his hands.

Jazz instantly dropped everything she was doing, “Danny?”

“I’m fine, Jazz,” he lied, “I’m just… bored.”

Jazz assessed him at first, probably determining whether or not it’d be worth it to call him out on his lie. “Then what do you want to do?”

Danny took a moment to think about it, but still couldn’t come up with a good distraction. “I don’t know.”

“What about a training session?” Vlad said hesitantly from the doorway, suddenly popping into the conversation, looking tired as hell but nearly the same as he’d always been, “We can start light?”

Jazz went on the defensive the moment Vlad made himself known, glaring at him and watching his every move. Andrew looked up from his reading, but he didn’t seem too concerned, simply guarded like he was waiting to see what happened next. Danny watched them both before turning to Vlad and looking him up and down, considering him and his offer.

Normally, he’d jump at the chance to not trust Vlad. Normally, he would have automatically turned the fruitloop down because, duh, he’s manipulative and evil.

But these weren’t normal circumstances anymore.

He’d seen Vlad before he passed out. He’d seen Vlad go completely nuts and break down. He’d seen Vlad… actually care about his dad. Vlad had been devastated equally at the loss of _both_ his parents. He could also see, right in front of him, that Vlad had lost some spark. His eyes were duller, though they were also nervous and determined. Vlad slumped, his arms were held in front of him tightly, and he looked like an overall tired mess. He didn’t look intimidating in the least bit.

Jazz thought it was all some sort of elaborate ruse, that he was playing injured so they’d trust him and then he’d enact some sort of evil revenge. Danny thought that however smart and analytical she was, that she was overthinking this.

What revenge would Vlad even be getting? Hadn’t his goal been to marry mom and murder dad? And maybe make Danny his son? Vlad didn’t have the motivation left in him to carry out nefarious plots. And Danny _had_ always admired his skill and strength, even though it was used for evil. He didn’t really have anything else to lose.

“Okay.”

The reactions were mixed.

Vlad looked a little stunned that Danny had agreed, but the small smile that appeared after he recovered convinced Danny that he’d made the right decision. Andrew looked at him, nodded, then went back to reading. Jazz started hissing at him.

“Danny! I can’t believe you! Vlad is the bad guy, remember! He’s trying to manipulate you!”

“To do what, Jazz?” Danny bit back, already rising from the pillows he’d been lounging on. He may not completely trust the older halfa, but he wasn’t going to throw away a potential ally either. He’d done enough of that when he’d first started out as a hero.

Jazz narrowed her eyes and stood to be at eye level with him, “Just because we don’t know what he’s planning or why, doesn’t mean he’s not hiding a secret agenda! You’re already weak right now, Danny! I’m not going to let him have the opportunity to hurt you more!”

Danny growled, “I am not _weak_ , Jazz! And I don’t need you coddling me! I’m going to take Vlad’s offer and that’s final! So kindly, fuck off!”

Jazz was silent and hurt, rearing back like Danny had physically slapped her. Her hands curled into fists and they trembled. She said nothing as she sat back down and went back to studying.

Danny didn’t care. He was too angry.

Andrew was staring at him, quiet but full of concern. He didn’t make a move to get up though and Danny appreciated it. He didn’t need comfort right now, he needed a distraction and somewhere to vent his frustration. Danny shook his head at him and he went back to reading, but not without sneaking glances to check on him. It helped to calm down a bit of the fury running through him, but it wasn’t enough.

He turned to Vlad, who looked completely taken aback, and stormed past him out the door. “Come on, fruitloop, let’s go.”

Vlad followed without a word.

* * *

“I thought you said we’d be training!” Danny nearly screamed in frustration. He wanted to punch something, not sit here and meditate! He fidgeted restlessly on the cushion Vlad had found and glared up at the older halfa.

After leaving the main room of the library they’d explored for a proper place to train and had found (with a little gentle guidance from Vidya) a large room that looked like it might have been for storage but was now completely empty, leaving plenty of floor space and nothing to damage. But, much to Danny’s disappointment, they hadn’t done anything else but _sit_ for twenty minutes.

“We are training,” Vlad said mildly, “If you want to do the fancy tricks,” Vlad juggled a fiery ball of ectoplasm from one hand to other, letting it change shape as he talked, “you’ll have to learn to _control_ everything.” The pink fire danced between his hands, forming recognizable patterns and forms, like reverse shadow puppets, before he drew it all back into his fists and extinguished the flames.

“Your core is cracked,” he said simply, pointing to the faint purple glow that still surrounded Danny’s chest, “and until that’s healed up, everything’s going to be harder for you to control.”

Danny scowled, “Are you saying I can’t do _anything_?”

Vlad scowled right back, “No. I’m saying that it’s going to be _hard_. You are anything but weak, Daniel. Don’t think I can’t see that that’s part of the problem here. Control over your powers, control over your _self_ ; body _and_ mind, would be first on the list of things for you to learn regardless of the state of your core. I’m merely giving you a _warning_. Nothing will be easy.”

Danny settled down, but he was still restless with pent up frustration, “So why’s control so important, then? I get that it’d be bad if my powers went haywire, but why is it the first thing I have to learn? How do I learn to control something I haven’t learned yet?”

“You make a fair point,” Vlad conceded, “but keeping calm and having strict mastery over your core energy will come in handy over any other powers I can teach you. Think of it like a base skill set, if you will. What you have already learned is like the alphabet.”

Danny snorted, but didn’t interrupt further when Vlad gave him a look that could rival any scary school teacher. He put on his best listening face and Vlad continued with a satisfied smile.

“You know the very basics. You’ve taught yourself how to read and recognize letters, you’ve harnessed your base powers like intangibility and invisibility and so on and so forth. Learning control is like learning how to write. Once I’ve taught you the basics… It’ll be like giving you a pen and a blank piece of paper. You can create and do things with your powers I might not even begin to imagine, let alone teach you. Once you can manipulate your core, your abilities will only be limited by your energy and your imagination.”

Danny tried to make sense of the analogy, and he thought he could grasp it. Maybe. Once he knew how to regulate his core… he’d be able to do just about anything with it. Vlad was teaching him how to take the reins… where he went from there was up to him. At least that’s what he thought Vlad was saying.

“What about powers like duplication and stuff? Are you going to teach me those?”

Vlad smirked, “Grammar and punctuation. I can help guide you and give you tips once you’ve started writing, but you will have creative license.”

Danny frowned, “The writing analogy’s getting kind of weird.”

“Fine, fine.” Vlad waved his hand to dismiss it before pointing a stern finger at Danny, “But now that you know _why_ you are ‘sitting here doing nothing’, are you going to actually do it?”

Danny grumbled but he readjusted himself and settled down on his cushion, doing as Vlad told him too and concentrating on his core. He closed his eyes and tried to relax.

“Focus, Daniel,” Vlad’s voice, slow and calm, coached him through it all, “take deep breaths and imagine the center of your power. Visualize the ball of energy that makes up your core. Can you feel it?”

“No.”

“Then keep trying. Don’t worry, I already told you this would be a bit harder than usual, didn’t I? It might take time, but you’re still powerful in your own right. You can do this, little badger.”

Danny didn’t really know how to deal with this attitude change from Vlad. He was calm and encouraging and there wasn’t even a little hint evil intent. Danny had agreed to this as a way to put his faith in Vlad, but this was a little strange. Still, he tried to follow Vlad’s instructions and take his odd compliments to heart. Tension still laced his body, though, being on edge from such an unfamiliar situation and harboring lingering aggression. 

Vlad sighed a bit, noticing that Danny seemed to refuse to relax. He tried a new tactic.

“Roll your shoulders back,” he said.

“What?” Danny opened his eyes, confused.

“Roll them back,” Vlad repeated with a demonstration. “Then straighten up your spine. It’ll be more comfortable in the long run.”

Danny was skeptical but he did it anyway, closing his eyes again.

“Now concentrate on the muscles in your neck. Move your head, just _slightly_ , from side to side. Roll your head from one shoulder to the other then pick it back up. Concentrate on the muscles in your shoulders, tense them up, up, then let them fall down and relax,” Vlad’s low rumble filled the large empty space and banished all other thoughts that might have distracted Danny. “Next, do the same with the muscles in your arms. Tense them up… Then let them go. Concentrate on your lungs and your deep breaths. Keep them going, slow and steady. Lift up your chest, tense your abdomen, then sink into the ground.”

Danny did as instructed and he thought he could catch on to the pattern here, taking slow, deep breaths, he felt the tension in his muscles relax. He felt better with each new instruction to tense and relax. His body warmed and tingled and he felt so, so much better.  Once Vlad was done, Danny felt like a puddle of relaxed goo. The subtle aches in his muscles had faded away and the leftover frustration just seemed to leave his body and mind. Maybe meditating wasn’t so bad.

Vlad chuckled, “Feeling better, Daniel?”

“Yeah,” Danny sighed out, he knew this wasn’t a cure all for the knot of tangled emotion in his stomach but it was a start.

“Then visualize your core.”

Danny groaned a bit and rolled his eyes behind his eyelids, but he did as instructed, reaching deep down into whatever and thinking about a floating ball of ectoplasm. After a few silent moments, he thought he felt something. He concentrated on it further, trying to imagine what it looked like, what it felt like. Wobbly though it was, an image soon started taking shape in his mind, glowing and soft.

“Can you feel it yet, Daniel?”

“Yeah,” Danny said distractedly, still trying to keep focus on the tiny ball bouncing in his head, “I think I can.”

“Good. Can you tell me what color it is?”

“What?” Danny nearly lost sight of it before scrambling and going back to watching it. “Why does the color matter?”

“Just look and tell me.”

Danny let his tongue poke out between his teeth as his eyebrows furrowed and he took a harder look at what was probably his core. It was kind of hard to get a better look at something that wasn’t actually there. But he kept concentrating and soon… “Blue!”

“Hm,” Vlad hummed in contemplation, “I thought it might be. Now, let it go, little badger, anymore and you’ll get a headache.”

Danny opened his eyes, breaking his concentration with a pout. He wanted to know more about his core! He wanted to train more! But he also had questions for Vlad.

“Why’d you think it was gonna be blue? Why not green like the rest of my powers?”

Vlad smiled, “I told you, Daniel, those are the basics. They’re green because you haven’t learned to harness your powers yet. You’re still young. My powers were green when I first started out as well.”

“What.”

Vlad outright laughed. “You’d have known this with time, little badger. But I suspected your core might be blue because a few of your more advanced powers are blue. Like your ice.”

“Huh,” Danny said as he leaned forward and propped his head on his hand, “that… kind of makes sense, I guess. But still, hold on, your powers used to be green?!”

“Yes,” Vlad said simply, amused.

“Why?!”

“Green is the color of pure ectoplasm. When you’re using your powers they appear green because you’re using brute strength to manipulate pure ectoplasm. When you use your _core_ to manipulate ectoplasm, it becomes the color or your core, something unique to each ghost. All of us come in different shades. Yours is blue. Mine is pink. Clockwork’s is a light purple and Ghostwriter’s is a darker purple-blue.”

“Okay, so why haven’t I been taught this before?” Danny made a wide gesture with his hands, “This all seems kind of obvious in retrospect.”

Vlad shrugged.

Danny snorted, “Alright. Okay, so why do different ghosts have different colors?”

Vlad shrugged again.

“You’re not very helpful, just shrugging like that.”

“I don’t know the answer, Daniel. There’s a lot we still don’t know about ghosts.”

Danny nodded before standing up and stretching, they’d been sitting down for what felt like hours now and while he’d been relaxed he still felt a little stiff after being still for so long.

He heard Vlad sigh and turned around to face him directly, watching as Vlad’s shoulders tensed and his face seemed to age in seconds with the troubled expression etched into it.

“Why did you agree to this? Why did you let me teach you?” was his simple question. Danny kept standing but he paused as he thought about the answer, shoving his hands in his hoodie pocket.

“To be honest? I needed a distraction and, I dunno,” he shrugged, “Clockwork’s said you’d changed, so I thought, why not?”

Vlad scoffed weakly, tension in the room rising and becoming weird and stifling, “Why not, huh?”

“Vlad—”

“Because I’ve been a _monster_ for the past twenty years of my life, Daniel! Because you have absolutely no reason to trust me after all the things I’ve done to you! Because I still haven’t found a way to apologize to you and make up, even a little bit, for all of my wrongdoings!”

Vlad was shaking a bit at this point and Danny didn’t know what to do and he didn’t know what brought this all on and it was kind of freaking him out. He’d never seen Vlad like this before. Then again though, he’d been seeing a lot of new sides of Vlad, and it was starting to make him see that, deep down, Vlad was still human. That Vlad had a horrible tangled knot of emotions brewing in his chest just like he did. This was probably Vlad’s breaking point.

“There are so many things I need to apologize for, Daniel,” Vlad buried his head in his hands, but at least it sounded like he was calming down a little, “There are so many things I did wrong. I’m so sorry, Daniel. I’m so sorry for everything that I did, _everything_.”

“Okay.”

“What?”

“Okay,” Danny made a half-shrug sort of movement, “I accept your apology. I believe that you’ve changed. I may not _fully_ trust you, not yet anyway, but I think you deserve the chance to prove yourself.”

“ _Why?”_ Vlad stared at him with disbelief.

“Clockwork explained it,” Danny shuffled his feet where he stood, “How your obsession took over everything else. How you’ve promised now to be better. I’m a little angry at him right now, but I still trust him a lot, so-,” he shrugged again, “I’m willing to give you a chance.”

He glared. “Only one though.”

Vlad nodded. “Of course.”

“I saw you go berserk,” Danny said softly, “I saw you go crazy in the wreckage. That, more than anything, convinced me you weren’t all that bad to begin with.”

“Ah,” Vlad looked away, “Thank you, Daniel.”

“Sure.” Danny moved to leave the room, not wanting to really deal with all this anymore. Vlad was a mess, he was a mess. Everyone seemed like a mess lately. Quiet cuddling with Andrew sounded good about now.

“Are you feeling better now, at the very least?”

The concern and earnestness in Vlad’s voice made Danny pause and actually consider the question.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Good,” Vlad said firmly. “You are welcome to seek me out any time you want to train… or talk things out, if you wish.”

Danny tilted his head and thought about the offer. At this point he’d tried talking to everyone else without success and Vlad had, somehow, made him feel better with the mini training session. So what did he have to lose?

“I’ll think about it,” he said, “thanks, old man.”

Vlad smiled softly, “Anytime, Daniel.”


End file.
